Survey Finds Canadian Firefighters Need Training on Drug Lab Traps

Canada’s cops, firefighters and paramedics need better training on the hazards they face when inadvertently entering grow-ops and drug labs – some rigged with booby traps meant to injure or kill them.

That’s the strong message from three dozen so-called first responders in Canada’s major population centres who were surveyed in a recent study by the federal Justice Department.

“All first responders indicated that these ‘chance discoveries’ caused them the most concern in terms of the safety and health risks they face upon entering a site,” says the study, completed this spring.

“Drug production sites are often protected by anti-personnel devices and booby traps. These incendiary devices are intended to impede police investigations and prevent thefts.”

The report surveyed 36 emergency workers across Canada, part of a federal-provincial project begun in 2002 to tackle the rise of indoor marijuana cultivation facilities, known as grow-ops, and clandestine illegal-drug laboratories, or clan-labs.

The survey included telephone interviews with police officers, firefighters, paramedics and seven Health Canada chemists in all provinces except Atlantic Canada.

Each worker responded to an average of between five and 10 incidents each year that involved clan-labs, and between 10 and 20 that involved grow-ops. Sometimes there was a house fire, explosion or medical emergency – and in about half those cases, there was no warning of any illegal operation at the site. The study noted instances in Ontario of booby traps, such as electric wire attached to doors and windows, or a device that releases toxic chemicals on anyone entering.

“These anti-personnel devices in production sites are primarily intended to kill or injure people …Many participants in this study were fearful of accidentally walking into booby traps or suddenly finding themselves in the line of gunfire and/or near explosions.”

Grow-ops typically draw between three and 10 times the amount of electricity of a normal home, greatly increasing the risk of electrocution when firefighters burst in with hoses. Fires in these high-risk facilities are better doused with something other than water. Clan-labs, especially those producing methamphetamine, can also give off toxic vapours that readily penetrate standard protective clothing.

“The likelihood of police officers, firefighters and paramedics getting injured at clandestine labs is typically much higher when the labs are discovered by chance,” says the report, citing recent research.