Accidental Evacuation.....Should they Go or Should they Stay

[Bill J]

Hi.

Following an accidental evacuation, (callpoint struck by builder), 1700 people were evacuated from an office block in Wembley this morning.

Unfortunately, Security discovered it was accidental, and after about 60 seconds, silenced the alarm, and confusion reigned.

Now I know, they should not have silenced it, and that the evacuation should have continued until everyone reached a place of safety, instead of people being unsure as to why the bells stopped, some returning to work, some continuing to evacuate, and some phoning security and building management.

There is not a PA system.

Security believe they have done the right thing, saving the time of many of the companies on site.

Are there any words of wisdom where I can point out the error of their ways?

Bill

[Allen Higginson]

Generally speaking,the procedure is that if there has been no prior notification of potential sounding of the fire alarm (due to testing or works) then it's out if the bells go. I,as an engineer,accidentally sounded the fire alarm (lesson learnt,haven't done it since) and the staff evacuated,only to be stopped by their HR manager when he discovered it was me.He was in the process of giving me a chewing when the fire safety officer arrived on site in response to his fire pager going off and was curious as to why the muster point was empty.HR manager was all proud in telling him that he turned the staff around and it was that idiots (me) fault - result? - he got a serious dressing down for not obeying policy to evacuate and wait until the fire officer had attended and decides that there is no need to escalate to further action.Yes, it was a false alarm and it was identified as such but the policy was in place and should have been followed.
If the brigade is called in the same situation they will ask the same question and take a dim view on non-evacuation - here the bells are kept ringing until they attend.

[kurnal]

The biggest enemies in a fire alarm situation are complacency and confusion.

If as a result of a well intended but ill conceived decision to stop the evacuation in mid flow many people will hve been left confused and will be reluctant to respond next time because the alarm may stop after 1 or 2 or 5 or 10 minutes.
So there is now a need to reinforce the procedures with a fire evacuation exercise to remind staff of what should happen-- and so theres a double waste of time as a result.

In such large buildings I usually recommend an additional fire warden be nominated in ALL fire alarm situations as a monitoring officer. They have a written brief and a clip board and report to the Fire Marshall on the efficiency of the evacuation, whether for real or not. This way you have the evidence to justify use of unplanned alarms and fires as the mandatory annual fire evacuation exercise, lessons learned are recorded and actioned.

[Graeme]

tut tut Buzzy.
I have never done that

[steve walker]

Just to play Devil's Advocate here; how about if the premises is a large hotel at 3am? The evacuation times are notoriously long; are we really suggesting that the staff, when they know it is a false alarm, wait until everyone has left the building before they allow the guests back to their rooms?

[kurnal]

The enemy is different. complacency and confusion still rule but the guests are not likely to learn bad habits from the incident.
They will probably ignore the alarm in any case till the staff and then the Brigade go and rouse them even if its a goer. Interesting who you sometimes meet under such circumstances!
But at what stage and after what investigation will the staff decide its a false alarm? Unless the alarm is addressable the chances are that the time taken to investigate> the evacuation time of all those who are likely to walk. And if it is addressable why not configure a delay for the purposes of investigation?

[Gary Howe]

The incident described in Wembley, highlights the importance of configuring an investigation timer (as already mentioned by Kurnal), there is security on site, with the correct level of training all this panic and confusion, loss of business etc,etc could have been quite easily avoided.

[fred]

I guess the business lost during this evacuation could go some way towards paying for a PA system ....
Q E D

[Allen Higginson]

Just to play Devil's Advocate here; how about if the premises is a large hotel at 3am? The evacuation times are notoriously long; are we really suggesting that the staff, when they know it is a false alarm, wait until everyone has left the building before they allow the guests back to their rooms?

Been there three times and have had to evac. on each occassion until brigade okay'd readmiitence (as  a guest,different hotels and,yes,there would appoear to be a pattern emerging there!!!)

[Allen Higginson]

tut tut Buzzy.
I have never done that

Must be great to be pefect (how's your nose growing these days??).

[Bill J]

Hi all.

I am not sure I would  recommend an investigation timer on callpoints, unless in a prison institute or similar, I can understand the need on Detectors, but callpoints is a no no in my opinion.

There is no way would the block ever get a PA or Similar, the cost would be prohibitive, the majority of the tenants are 2/3 people in one company on a floor shared with 20 or so other companies.

I have recommended that the Security team be hung drawn and quartered, but even then, they will still do it again under the same circumstances.

Thanks for the opinions

Bill

[AnthonyB]

Not only is there confusion & increased complacency, but there is a greater risk of injury if you stop an evac half way with opposing flows meeting. The cost from litigation for injury sustained during such a mess up would soon put an organisation back on the right tracks.

Injury can occur in evacs, in fact more so than in fires! One building we carried out monitored drils at had a fire, but no one was even slightly hurt by it - in fact the only injuries vaugely associated with fire were during a drill where people were tight up against a stairwell final exit (saw the padlock on a redlam bolt & thought they were locked in) and then the obvious injuries from karate chopping a Redlam bolt that has a glass rather than ceramic tube! (& yes it did actually have it's hammer! needless to say, our recommendations for a anti panic fastening were suddenly taken on board & led to the redlam bolts going on the high flow routes & the few low flow routes retaining the bolts but with Ceramtubes, better signs & better training)

Instead of concentrating on how to abort a non fire evacuation, time and resources should instead be aimed at preventing or at the very least reducing Unwanted Fire Signals in the first place so the only time you evac is twice a year for drills and the day the fire comes for real.

I've been stuck in the middle of a freezing car park at 4am for half an hour in December with minimal clothing because the hotel fire alarm went off, but would rather be out of the way with the brigade checking things out than be kept in until a fire was confirmed.