Promoting Safe Egress and Evacuation for People with Disabilities

• 1. Foreword
• 2. Introduction
• 3. Initial Review
• 4. Egress Policy
• 5. Planning for Egress
• 6. ImplementingYour Egress Plan
• 7. Measuring Performance of Your Egress Plan
• 8. Reviewing Performance of Your Egress Plan
• 9. Conclusion Page
• Appendix 1. Glossary of Terms
• Appendix 2. PEEP Questionnaire and Template
• Appendix 3. Risk Assessment Checklist
• Appendix 4. Further Information

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3. Initial Review

Introduction

The completion of an initial review will assist with meeting the following aims of this document:

• Aim 1 - to provide the reader with an appreciation of the problem and an understanding of egress issues that particularly affect people with disabilities; and
• Aim 2 - to impart the ability to identify egress features that are normally designed into buildings, and the capability of using this information in preparing risk assessments and emergency evacuation plans.

Before getting involved in the detail of developing and implementing the emergency egress plan, it is important to take an overview of the current situation and establish the desired outcomes.

3.1 Carrying Out the Initial Review

The first step in the initial review is to bring together all the information held by the organisation that relates to emergency egress matters.

The following are some examples of the pieces of information that might be available:

• Safety Statement;
• Fire and General Records Register;
• Minutes of Health and Safety meetings;
• Any existing emergency egress plan;
• The Fire Certificate for the building, including any fire engineering strategy that formed part of the fire certificate application for the building. The Fire Certificate will usually comprise of a written report with associated fire safety drawings;
• Existing access audit or risk assessments for egress that may be available, which identify problems and detail the mitigating steps that have been taken in the past;
• information on life safety systems installed in the building. Such systems will include fire detection and warning, escape lighting, fire suppression, wayfinding and smoke control systems;
• information on the specification and operation of passenger and other lifts;
• feedback reports from previous emergency evacuations, both actual and fire drills;
• statistical information on fire alarm activation frequency, false alarms, locations times etc;
• records of fire safety or evacuation training given to staff;
• the number and location of fire and evacuation wardens;
• Personal Evacuation Egress Plans (PEEPs); and
• feedback from building users.

This information can be collated and held centrally for reference during the planning process.

The second stage of the initial review is to determine the egress needs for staff and visitors. This can be best achieved by surveys, questionnaires or interviews with staff and other users of the building, including visitors, contractors and attendees at training courses and meetings.

The final stage of the initial review is to consider the information gained in stages 1 and 2 and use it to:

• identify egress needs;
• highlight current problems with emergency egress; and
• establish the scope and objectives of the emergency egress management system.

3.2 Initial Review - Summary

• Gather all available existing information;
• Find out about the egress needs of staff and other building users;
• Review the information to determine objectives.

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