FOCUS
Strategies shared The first of two annual sector seminars from TagEvac gave delegates insight into elements of evacuation, writes William Roszczyk
was a ‘tragedy waiting to happen’ that ‘we must ensure never happens again’. There should be no such complacency going forward, and he asked what the industry can to do to effect positive change. Outlining the four evacuation options of stay
T
put, phased progressive horizontal, staged and full simultaneous or total evacuation – he said that any option should ‘refer to your overall fi re strategy and factors’ such as building occupancy or size. Reasons for implementing stay put include high incidence of false alarms, congestion, relative safety and lack of holistic systems, alongside designed compartmentation. The issue is that many involved in procurement
don’t know the correct fi re safety terminology, while limitations of and myths about building control lead to people thinking it is a fi re safety ‘fairy godmother’. This assumption imagines that building control takes full responsibility for fi re safety management. He then examined progressive horizontal
evacuation through care home and hospital evacuations, with patients ideally removed safely and to an adjacent, protected area of ‘relative safety’. However, when the model is put to the test
48 SEPTEMBER 2018
www.frmjournal.com
AGEVAC’S ALAN Oliver referenced the ‘huge impact’ Grenfell continues to have on the industry, stating that ‘we have failed’ – the fi re
it often ‘fails miserably’, with two hospital fi res in London seeing complete evacuations instead, and a lack of focus means that ‘something’s not right’. Thankfully nobody died in either fi re – one being at Royal Marsden Hospital – but the issues were signifi cant enough to force reassessments in thinking. Touching on different types of fi re risk assessments (FRAs), evacuation management and training, Mr Oliver spoke on case studies in which evacuations did not go to plan, including the fatal fires at St Michael’s Hospice in the UK and the US Station nightclub fi re. In such cases, people ‘don’t behave normally’,
so a ‘back to basics’ strategy is required, including revisiting an emergency plan, training and equipment. Fire and rescue services (FRSs) need to know if there is a fi re and where it is, as well as who is in the building.
Tall buildings
Horizonscan’s Russ Timpson stated that the Tall Building Safety Network had been ‘warning about ACM [aluminium composite material] for years’, pointing out that 432 new tall buildings are expected to be completed in London in the next three years. Most will have only one staircase, and consequently post Grenfell, he urged that a ‘new
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