An investigation by officers at the London Fire Brigade has resulted in the prosecution of the owners of a nursing home in Barnet following a fire in May 2005.
Park Care Homes Limited, who owned and operated Ravenscroft Park Nursing Home in Barnet were fined £200,000 at Harrow Crown Court on Friday 16 February for contraventions of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999.
When fire crews arrived at the incident they found smoke coming from the first floor windows of the three storey building.
Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus discovered the fire in the basement and managed to stop it from spreading to other floors, but heavy smoke had spread throughout the entire property.
During the hearing the court were presented with statements from firefighters who attended the incident describing their actions and the difficulties they faced in evacuating people due to locked doors and smoke logged hallways.
Fifty six people including twelve members of staff had been in the premises when the fire started.
The Defendants had pleaded guilty to 13 Summonses. However, the Judge was of the opinion that the first two offences that 'The risk assessment was not suitable or sufficient' and that 'Appropriate procedures to be followed in the event of serious imminent danger to persons at work at Ravenscroft Park Nursing Home were not established' adequately demonstrated the seriousness of the offences and effectively comprised within them all the elements of the other 11 offences.
Barnet Borough Commander Nick O'Reilly said: 'This prosecution comes as a timely reminder of the importance of having both a suitable and sufficient Fire Risk Assessment and Emergency Plan at the introduction of the new Fire Safety Order 2005.
The new order put the duty of fire safety squarely on the shoulders of the responsible person and this judgment indicates the consequence of getting it wrong.
'Nine people were rescued by fire crews following the smoke logging of the building caused by fire safety contraventions. Although there were no serious injuries 14 residents were taken to hospital for check-ups.
A suitable and sufficient Fire Risk Assessment and Emergency Plan might not have prevented the fire but as the Judge agreed it would have reduced the effects of the fire causing less risk to both the occupants and the fire crews.
'I would like to thank all of the officers and personnel who made this prosecution successful, and remind those responsible for properties of the need to carry out a full and comprehensive risk assessment and emergency plan.'
On 17 March 2009 thirty-seven residents were rescued after a blaze at a Wrexham nursing home.
The fire broke out in Pendine Park nursing home, Summerhill Road, Stansty, Wrexham just after 5pm yesterday.
Residents were evacuated from the home by staff and fire crews and one person was treated by ambulance staff for smoke inhalation.
Three fire appliances from Wrexham and Chirk were at the scene.
Proprietor Mario Kreft said: "I would like to commend the manager and our staff for the prompt and professional way they responded.
"Nobody was hurt and minor damage was confined to one room. All the residents have now returned to Penybryn.
"The fact that the situation was kept under control is testament to our rigorous training regime and the fact that, when Penybryn was built two years ago, we insisted on the highest possible safety standards.
"The safety and well-being of our residents is always our greatest priority and our record of providing first class care over nearly 25 years is one that we are extremely proud of."
He added: "The fire was restricted to the Penybryn section of the home, which cares for people aged under 65 with neurological disorders."
Veronica Smaje, manager of the Penybryn section, said: "Everybody did so well. The staff were wonderful and everything was quite calm."
A spokesperson from North Wales Fire and Rescue said: "The cause of the fire is being investigated by North Wales Police and North Wales Fire and Rescue."
Gareth Griffiths, legislation manager for North Wales Fire and Rescue Service, said: "This stresses the importance of carrying out risk assessments for these types of premises and any other commercial premises."
A working smoke alarm has helped to save a family from a serious fire at their Gosport property.
Control room operators received a 999 emergency call at 00:21 on Tuesday 17 March to reports of a fire at a property in Grange Crescent, Gosport.
Two fire appliances from Gosport and one from Fareham Fire Station were despatched and arrived to find a fire which had started in a cupboard under the stairs rapidly developing.
A working smoke alarm meant the family had been alerted to the fire and had enough time to evacuate the property safely and call the fire service.
A 65-year-old man has died after suffering serious burns during a fire at his Perth nursing home on Saturday 21 March 2009.
Edward Waddle was taken to hospital after the blaze broke out at the Tayside Care Home just before 0100 GMT.
Mr Waddle had been at the home since last December and died at Ninewells Hospital, Dundee, at 1600 GMT.
A Tayside Fire and Rescue spokesman said the building was evacuated of all 52 people, including 47 residents, and no-one else was injured.
Tayside Police said the fire, which was not suspicious, was "limited in size" and was dealt with quickly.
A "full joint investigation" was carried out into the incident by fire and police officers. A report is being prepared for the procurator fiscal.
In early 2008 the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) carried out a consultation to evaluate the effectiveness of ‘First Aid in the Workplace’. As a result of the consultation, from 1 October 2009 significant changes to the first aid at work regulations will be implemented.
What are the main changes to the first aid at work courses?
The current 4 Day First Aid at Work Course will become a 3 Day First Aid At Work (FAW) Course. First Aid At Work certificates will continue to be valid for a period of 3 years.
At the end of the 3 year validity period the current 2 Day First aid at Work Requalification Course will still be required to renew First Aid At Work certificates for a further 3 years.
A new HSE approved 1 Day Emergency First Aider in the Workplace (EFAW) will also be introduced. This course will also be valid for 3 years. It is intended that this course will be broadly similar to the current Appointed Person course and that most appointed persons will in future follow the Emergency First Aider in the Workplace course. For the first time this type of training can only be offered by HSE and Qualification and Curriculum Authority (QCA) approved training providers. Previously the Appointed Person course was completely outside of the HSE regulations and approval process, meaning that there was no guarantee of either quality or consistency.
The other significant change is that the HSE will recommend that any person trained in either the 3 day First Aid At Work (FAW) or 1 Day Emergency First Aider in the Workplace (EFAW), attend a ½ day ‘Skills Update’ course at the end of both year 1 and year 2. This new recommendation is designed to increase the level of first aider effectiveness by ensuring that skills and knowledge learnt during these courses are practiced and reinforced on a more frequent basis, than within the current first aid training structure.
When do the changes come in to effect?
The proposed date is 1 October 2009.
Should I wait until October 2009?
No. All employers need to continue to ensure a sufficient level of First Aiders in the workplace to meet the needs of their risk assessment. It is probable that the content of the new courses will be very similar to those currently in place and therefore the HSE has stated that current training will remain valid up until three years after October 2009.
When will the Requalification Training be due?
The new 3 day FAW and 1 day EFAW courses will be valid for 3 years. At the end of the 3 year period a 2 day Requalification course will be required for the 3 day FAW course. For those who have attended the EFAW course, they will need to attend the same course again at the end of the 3 year period.
The HSE strongly recommend that all those personnel trained in first aid, attend a ½ day Skills Update Course at the end of year 1 and year 2 as their skills and knowledge can deteriorate rapidly once a course is completed.
How many people do I need to train and which course should they attend?
To evaluate the number of First Aiders that are required for your business you will need to carry out a Risk Assessment. The following factors should be considered when assessing your needs:
Specific workplace hazards and risk
The size of the organization ie the number of employees
The history of accidents, referring to your accident book is a good starting point
The needs of traveling, remote and lone workers. This should include company vehicle drivers and home workers.
Employees working on shared or multi-occupied sites.
Potential holidays, sickness and shift patterns of trained personnel.
In the main, larger workplaces and higher risk sites will require more FAW trained personnel. Smaller, low risk workplaces may require only EFAW trained personnel, although this will depend entirely on the result of the workplace risk assessment.
The HSE will provide companies with a basic guide for employers prior to the release of the new changes. These can be found on www.hse.gov.uk/firstaid
New legislation dictates that your staff must receive training in Fire Safety with someone being trained in the use of Fire Fighting Equipment. The level and depth of training very much depends on the processes, products and type of work your employees carry out.
A small business with no dangerous goods or procedures and which operates in simple premises will only require basic fire safety awareness. Start to carry out dangerous operations, work in crowded complex premises, or deal with large numbers of the public and the level of fire safety awareness needs to be increased.
If you work with dangerous substances or processes you may need dedicated well-trained ‘Works Fire Teams’.
We are able to offer a variety of courses tailored to suit your needs.
The new code of practice for fire safety in the design, management and use of buildings; BS9999 is published by BSI and came into effect on 6 October 2008. The British Standard BS9999:2008 supersedes most of the BS5588 series (Part 0 and Part 5 to Part 12) and DD9999:2005 which will be withdrawn on 6 April 2009. This bulletin concentrates on the effect that the new standard has on means of escape design and the various parameters that must be taken into account to ensure a satisfactory level of safety is achieved when designing or refurbishing means of escape in buildings.
BS9999:2008 provides guidance that gives a more transparent and flexible approach to fire safety design through use of a structured approach to risk-based design. Much of the guidance in the British Standard is based on fire safety engineering principles and research although it is not intended to be a guide to fire safety engineering.
BS9999:2008 is designed as a co-ordinated package covering the four main areas that influence fire safety measures, namely:
• The provision of means of escape;
• The provision of access and facilities for fire-fighting;
• The structural protection of escape facilities and the structural stability of the building in the event of a fire;
• Fire safety management levels.
Designing Means of Escape
The guidance is based on the principal of the Available Safety Egress Timeline. The time to escape to a place of relative safety should be less than the allowable travel time which is based on the risk profile. Four major stages of occupant response should be taken into account in determining the provision of means of escape:
• The time to detect a fire and sound an alarm;
• The pre-movement time which consists of the recognition and the response time;
• The travel time, including queuing, to a place of relative safety;
• The movement time within a place of relative safety.
A minimum package of fire protection measures covering management level, automatic fire detection & alarm, lighting & signage etc must be provided to allow the occupants to escape from the building in the event of a fire. Indeed, the package of fire precautions provided for a building should reflect the nature of the use of the building, the occupants, the processes, the materials stored and used, and the fire safety management provided. These characteristics are categorised as risk profiles, which provide a basis against which the risk to occupants can be assessed. A risk profile should be established for each building in order to determine the appropriate means of escape provisions.
There are a number of general principles used to determine whether the means of escape are acceptable. However circumstances can vary and the means of escape chosen for a building should reflect the particular needs of that building.
Horizontal Means of Escape
The provision of means of escape from any point in a storey to the nearest storey exit of a protected area on the floor in question defines the horizontal means of escape.
Number of occupants
First the engineer must determine the maximum number of persons who are present in the premises at any one time. A realistic estimate of the maximum occupancy of a room, storey, building or part of a building is either:
• The maximum number of persons it is designed to hold or,
• The number calculated by dividing the area of a room or storey (m2) by the appropriate floor space factor (m2/person).
Number of escape routes
Once the maximum occupancy in the premises has been determined, it is possible to identify the minimum number of escape routes necessary to allow all occupants to evacuate safely.
However the number of escape routes and exits that will be needed is mainly dependant on the risk profile, the number of occupants and the limits on travel distance to the nearest storey exit.
Travel distances
The travel distances have been determined according to the risk profile and are based on the time available to reach a place of relative safety.
Width of doors, corridors and escape routes
The width of the doors given in Table 13 of BS9999 depends on the risk profile. The total door width should be not less than the aggregate of the exit widths and not less than 800mm.
The width of a corridor or escape route should not be less than the calculated width of any door leading on to it, or 1200mm.
Vertical Means of Escape
Vertical escape involves the transition from horizontal escape from a building to a place of ultimate safety. Therefore the design for vertical means of escape should meet the recommendations for horizontal escape for each storey exit in a building.
Design of escape stairs
Generally, every internal escape stair should be a protected stair i.e. it should be constructed within a fire-resisting enclosure.
Every protected stairway should discharge directly to a final exit, or by way of a protected exit passageway to a final exit.
Under certain conditions such as having a single escape stair, a stair serving any storey more than 18m high or in a building designed for phased evacuation, the stair should be designed with a protected lobby or corridor or a pressure differential system.
Where stairs are not lobby protected it is necessary to discount a whole stair when considering the means of escape capacity for the building.
The final exit route from a stairway should be at least as wide as the stair leading to it. Where an exit route from a stairway also forms the escape route from the ground and/or basement floors, the width of the exit route may need to be increased accordingly and is be calculated using the merging flow formula given in BS9999.
Formula for merging flow at final exit:
W = [(N/2.5) + (60S)] /80
Where:
W: width of final exit in metres
N: number of people served by ground floor
storey exit
S: stair width in metres
Number of escape stairs
The number of escape stairs is controlled by:
• The horizontal escape routes design,
• The acceptability of a single stair,
• Mixed occupancy building,
• The provision of adequate width for escape assuming that a stair may not be available due to fire or smoke.
Width of escape stairs
The width of the stair depends on how the building is designed in terms of evacuation. It can be either simultaneous evacuation or phased evacuation.
The width of escape stairs is based on the occupant flow rate considering a simultaneous evacuation i.e. the escape stairs should have the capacity to allow all floors to be evacuated at the same time and should:
• Not be less than the width of any exit affording access to them;
• Not be reduced at any point on the way to a final exit;
For the simultaneous design, the escape stairs should be wide enough to accommodate all floors being evacuated simultaneously. The width therefore depends on the number of people using the stair on each storey.
It can be advantageous to design stairs in high buildings on the basis of phased evacuation. It allows for narrower stairs than would be the case for simultaneous evacuation.
Basement stairs
If an escape stair forms part of the only route from the upper storeys of a building it should not be continued down to serve any basement storey.
If there is more than one escape stair from the upper storeys, only one of the stairs serving the upper storeys need be terminated at ground level. Others stairs may connect with the basement if there is a ventilated protected lobby, or a ventilated protected corridor between the stairs and accommodation at each basement level.
Additional Fire Protection Measures
Every building should incorporate the minimum level of fire protection recommended. However if additional fire protection measures are provided, such as enhanced automatic detection and warning systems or high ceilings it is permissible to increase the travel distance and reduce the door and the stair widths. These travel distances, door and stair widths are subject to specified maxima.
Automatic sprinklers indirectly by changing the risk profile
The provision of automatic sprinklers affects the risk profile. Such provision restricts fire growth, prevents fire spread and limits heat and smoke generation. This means that if sprinkler systems are installed in a building or part of a building, the fire growth rate can be reduced within the sprinklered room or building. Therefore an A3 building can be considered as an A2 building where sprinklers are provided.
Automatic detection and warning systems
The provision of automatic smoke detection can be of significant benefit in terms of providing early warning for the occupants. The response of occupants is generally enhanced by the installation of a fire warning system that provides information about a fire incident. Where a clear benefit resulting from the addition of detection and alarm systems is demonstrated, a 15% increase in allowable travel distance and 15% reduction in door width, corridor width and stair can be applied.
Effect of ceiling heights
For rooms with high ceilings, it is permissible to increase the travel distance and decrease the door, corridor and stair width as they have a greater capacity to hold smoke and delay the time taken to fill with smoke to a level that affects escape.
Where additional fire precautions are provided, such as enhanced AFD or high ceilings, variations in travel distance and door and stair widths are allowed however a clear benefit must be shown: e.g. going from L2 to L1 may not show clear benefit.
Conclusion
This bulletin provides an overview of the process when designing means of escape in a building under the new Code of Practice for Fire Safety BS9999. It must be noted that all the elements discussed previously should be considered as a whole. Indeed fire safety provisions can be seriously compromised by a lack of management of fire safety, inadequate facilities for fire-fighting or a lack of appropriate related measures in the construction of the building.
It is not acceptable therefore to ‘cherry pick’ from the standard those parts which are considered to benefit the design.
Considerable benefit can be given to a design through the use of the BS9999 standard where extended travel distances are required.