POINT OF VIEW
The Future of Fire Alarm Systems
By Barry Luz I
n today’s world, we worry about dan- ger from inclement weather conditions, terrorists, disease, drunk drivers, as well as fear of making our mortgage payments, feeding our children, and keeping our jobs, just to name a few. Although we generally take for granted our safety in public spaces, in reality, this is probably one of our greatest dangers. For more than 100 years fire alarms systems have been the gold standard for notifying building occupants that there is an emergency in a building. How- ever, time and experience have shown that the “basic” fire alarm system isn’t always the best way to notify people of danger. Studies show that 60 per cent of people that lose their lives in an emergency situation do so because they did not know how to react. Over half the people that die in an emergency just didn’t know where to go or what to do. Another statistic tells us that systems that use only ring or tone signals are often misunderstood, but a spoken mes- sage is understandable. I’ve been in two hotels when the fire alarm went off and I must tell you, it took me a few min- utes to wake up and realize what was going on, as both emergencies were in the middle of the night. For a good 30 seconds, I wondered if it was a “real” emergency or just a false alarm. Truth be told, I didn’t know what to do. It turns out, one of the emergencies was a water main break and the other was someone smoking in a bathroom. In both incidences, the fire alarm sys- tems worked flawlessly and no doubt would have saved lives if either of these emergencies had truly been life threat- ening. However, as the second statistic suggests, imagine that instead of the typical fire alarm tone, a voice command
had come over the speaker system and issued a message stating something like, “We are experiencing a fire emergency, leave the building immediately by the north stairwell, do not use the eleva- tors.” There would have been no doubt in my mind of what to do, no ambiguity in what the emergency was, or what my response to it should be. I would not have questioned my own past experi- ences and would have followed the command for my own safety. I believe this is how fire alarm systems and mass notification systems should be designed. There are a number of fire alarm sys- tems on the market now that conduct rudimentary voice messaging, and this is a step in the right direction to address the two aforementioned problems. Rec- ommendations from NFPA 72, 2010 Edition should be heeded as these are safety codes and recommendations based on long-term studies and experi- ence of detection, alarm, alerting and messaging systems that are very effec- tive at preserving human life. However, building owners, managers and stake- holders have often told me this: “Let me get this straight, you want me to buy a fire alarm system with speakers in it, a paging system with speakers in it, and a sound reinforcement system with speakers in it, all in the same building or room? Why can’t I have one system do it all?”
Perhaps you’ve had this same conver- sation with your clients too. They know that three speaker systems will most likely mean three sets of piping costs and three sets of labour costs mak- ing it practically cost prohibitive. Hence the “I’ll-take-the-least-expensive-fire- alarm-system-you-have-that-meets-code -and-heck-with-the-rest” conversation
28 SECURITY PRODUCTS CANADA| Winter 2011
BY INSTALLING A MASS NOTIFICATION SYSTEM THAT CAN CLEARLY EXPLAIN TO PEOPLE IN A BUILDING WHAT TO DO IN CASE OF AN EMERGENCY, YOU TRULY WILL BE HELPING SAVE LIVES
you usually have after they see the final cost to implement the three systems. What the client really needs is an in- tegrated mass notification system that includes, in its most basic form, a mod- ern fire control panel that can accommodate all the forms of detection devices (e.g., smoke detectors, CO de- tectors) required by local codes, connected to a mass notification system that provides other types of emergency inputs (e.g., panic buttons, help kiosks) that passes audio output to the one speaker system installed in the building or room. This configuration saves the building owner an enormous amount of money while still providing a very safe public or private environment for em- ployees and visitors. These types of systems, through computer program- ming, can provide many different automated or semi-automated messages and responses to a wide variety of emer- gency and non-emergency situations. If you are in the fire alarm business, I would suggest to partner with an audio company familiar with mass notification systems. Conversely, if you are in the audio business, partner with a fire alarm company that is in tune with the latest fire and life safety codes. Together, your respective companies can design, sell and install profitable systems that address the building owner’s need to help mitigate danger and fear during an emergency while keeping it within a reasonable budget for your customers.
Barry Luz is a systems applications specialist for Bosch Security Sys- tems, Communications Systems Division (
www.boschsecurity.us).
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