Once your employees have mastered a basic fire drill, your fire safety leaders should design more intricate scenarios. Large companies may favor doing this by building or by section to prevent business disruptions.
Next, you should conduct a full rehearsal with as many of your employees as possible. After the fire safety leaders understand their roles, they should physically walk through the fire drill. The team should describe their actions during a fire drill and analyze any perceived weaknesses or confusion. For example, your fire safety leaders could first rehearse “on paper” with a tabletop exercise where they describe the evacuation plan to the fire warden. Successful shutdown of equipment (where appropriate)Ĭonduct rehearsals of increasing complexity.Time from drill activation to evacuation.For instance, if your first drill takes 15 minutes to get everyone safely outside because you discover people are visiting the restroom or wrapping up calls, you have work to do. If you include these in your first drill, you can try to improve them in subsequent drills. Your fire safety team will want to set goals and standards for the drill. Include information about the fire team and their roles, orderly evacuation routes, and expectations for procedure and behavior. Schedule the drill on the company Outlook or Google calendar. Employee communication software that covers the most common communication channels will make this a lot easier. Announce the drill in every place employees will see it, including platforms such as an employee portal, intranet, website, Slack channel, newsletter, and text message. The key to a successful fire drill at work is communication. Third, and perhaps most importantly, all employees need to understand the importance of the fire drill otherwise, they won’t take it (or you) seriously.Second, you need executive buy-in since the drill will take people away from the factory line, their desks, and the warehouse.First, you must ensure the entire fire team (from the warden on down) is trained on the evacuation procedures and ready to make the drill a success.Everyone needs to be on board when you conduct a fire drill at work. But it’s not as easy as heading to the nearest pull station and pulling the alarm. Once you have your fire evacuation plan in place, you know the routes. Make sure to follow up and report using a modern employee notification system so you can determine the safety of all employees.Rehearse fire drills at least twice per year.Know your tools such as smoke detectors, fire alarms, and fire extinguishers.Plan and map evacuation routes, emergency exits, and evacuation procedures.Create a communication plan (using a redundant, multi-channel, two-way mass communication system such as AlertMedia makes this easy).Develop comprehensive fire drill procedures.Establish roles and responsibilities for the fire evacuation team, including that of fire warden.You can learn more about the specifics of how to create a fire evacuation plan for your business in this article, but here are the highlights: What is the fire code or maximum occupancy limit for your building (and is your office violating it)?.Do wildfires threaten your business during the summer?.Are there areas of the building more likely to start fires, like kitchen appliances or chemicals in the warehouse?.As part of this work, you’ll want to consider various scenarios: So, whether it’s tied to your fire safety program, active shooter preparedness, or overall risk mitigation strategy, evacuation skills should be a crucial element of all employees’ training.īefore sending building occupants scurrying for the exits at the sound of a fire alarm system, make a detailed fire evacuation plan. What to expect once emergency responders arrive.How to locate escape routes and where to go after vacating the premises.How to engage Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) when there’s a potential hazard.How to leave the office quickly in case of any emergency or life safety situation.They train employees on a number of potentially life-saving skills, including: However, fire drills are not only to prepare for fires. In fact, many landlords and office management companies require that organizations have emergency plans and conduct fire drills in their leases. Armed with stats like this, your company would be wise to plan regular fire drills. These fires caused roughly 3,700 civilian deaths, 16,600 civilian injuries, and $14.8 billion in property damage.
The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) reports that local fire departments responded to 1,291,500 fires in 2019 (that’s one fire every 24 seconds).
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