SECURITY & WELFARE Shine A Light
Paul Adams, Deputy Marketing Manager at Hochiki Europe, navigates the legislation landscape around Visual Alarm Devices (VADs) and underlines what care homes need to know to comply with regulations and keep residents safe.
The main way of warning a building’s occupants of a fi re is via an audible alarm signal. However, for those who are hard of hearing more is required to ensure they are aware of a potentially dangerous situation and able to escape if necessary. This is enshrined in current UK legislation and recently, further guidelines have been set out to offer even more clarity.
Fire protection systems must meet everyone’s needs, so special features — including VADs — have to be installed to complement standard fi re alarm products. VADs allow building occupants who are hard of hearing to see when a fi re alarm has been raised via a bright fl ashing light, so they know if and when to evacuate. The devices are also used in noisy environments such as factories, or in areas where an audible alarm is not acceptable, such as hospital operating theatres.
It has been compulsory to install VADs in all public buildings since the introduction of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, which has now largely been replaced by the Equality Act 2010. The aim of both acts is to ensure that people are not at a disadvantage in any context for any reason, including their age or disability.
On 31st December 2013, the British Standards Institution (BSI) EN54-23 standard for VADs became mandatory. It specifi es that if VADs are used on a fi re alarm system as a primary means of alerting building users, as is the case in many care facilities, they must fully comply with the regulation.
VADs are now only allowed to emit a red or white light and have a light output of no less than 0.4 lumens
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per square metre (Lux). They must also be classifi ed in one of three categories: ceiling mounted devices, wall mounted beacons, or open class. Each category has targets for light distribution, intensity and spread within the given area.
Although the introduction of Part 23 may have been confusing at fi rst, an industry benchmark did need to be established. In the past, the effi ciency of a VAD device was often diffi cult to determine as different manufacturers specifi ed performances in either candela, joules or watts. Under Part 23, all manufacturers must present product performance data in exactly the same way to facilitate direct comparisons with similar products and better assessments of suitability of products for specifi c applications.
Another recent requirement for care home fi re safety, which was introduced in March 2013 under BS 5839-1, requires an analogue addressable fi re detection system to be installed at any premises where there are sleeping facilities for more than 10 residents who will need assistance to evacuate the building.
Analogue addressable fi re alarm devices can be individually identifi ed within a larger fi re alarm system via a central control panel. Each device sends an analogue value to the control panel based on how much smoke or heat is present and the control panel, not the detectors,
makes the decision on sounding the alarms. The use of this kind of intelligent system means that if a fi re is detected, its position can be pin-pointed precisely, as each device has a unique address which means its location can be easily determind.
The effective evacuation of a residential building could mean the difference between life and death in the event of a fi re. A well-designed fi re protection system that includes a compliant VAD system can help alert hard of hearing building users and ensure quicker escape. The recent regulations on this issue provide much clearer guidance on the standards each system must achieve to ensure greater levels of safety, and it is important that all care residences comply.
For further information about the Hochiki range of VADs and how they are compliant with the new British standard, watch this video.
www.hochikieurope.com
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