Is there signage/markings at the quench vent discharge, warning maintenance staff to remain clear?

Do you know your magnet’s active-shielding failure modes? Would the exclusion zone expand? How far? For how long? Who would be in the expanded area of magnetic field hazard? Is this a population at greater risk of adverse effects?

In a prescient 1997 article in Fire Engineering magazine, then Stockton, California, Captain Andrew M. Shapiro, offered the following advice to his colleagues, which any responders entering an MR suite should be aware of:

• Watch out for heavy smoke and flashover fires that can come from powerful AC units (and ducting) and computers and other electronics.


• Air cylinders; axes; pike poles; and most other steel, iron, or ferrous metal objects can become deadly projectiles and must be excluded from the scanner area.


• If possible, extinguish the fire without bringing equipment or personnel into the scanning room.


• Emergency responders with pacemakers, cerebral aneurysm clips, coronary artery stints, orthopedic prostheses, and certain types of artificial heart valves, and other medical implants that may be unsafe should not work near MR equipment. Also, those who have worked in welding, auto mechanics, or other similar work may have small metal fragments behind or embedded in the tissues of their eyes.


• Personnel working inside the MR scanning room will not be able to transmit or receive any radio communication, so runners should be used.

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