Standards Can Save Lives
Develop a Plan
Businesses have been preparing for and experiencing disasters and emergencies for as long as commerce has existed. Over the years, this process has focused largely on what is known as business continuity. Simply put, business continuity is the ability to carry on business operations in the wake of a natural or man-made disaster or disruption to normal business activities. Examples such as Katrina and 9/11 come to mind when thinking about business continuity.
Both of these events also offer an opportunity to examine the less-talked-about planning and procedures that businesses must develop to keep employees and on-site personnel safe in the event of any physical emergency or disaster. Human resource continuity for both business and facility management focuses on keeping employees safe and secure in the event of a fire or other environmental emergency.
Developing a focused human resource continuity plan can save the lives by ensuring a well-practiced and tested emergency evacuation plan, with the equipment needed to support it, is in place and known by building occupants. The article below will help facilities managers planning for human resource continuity by highlighting the standards, testing and certification to look for when choosing emergency escape equipment to support HRC planning for fire and other environmental emergencies.
Buyer Beware
Many, if not most, emergency escape products for environmental situations, such as fire, smoke and poisonous air, are not certified by any government or independent testing facility and may not provide the level of protection required to ensure a safe evacuation from a facility. How can HRC planners sift through the noise and misinformation of the emergency protection marketplace to ensure any solution they institute will perform at the levels required to maintain employee safety during an emergency situation?
First and foremost, it is necessary to form evacuation plans that move facility occupants away from the building and to a safe area. A crucial component of any plan will be the equipment used to guarantee occupants can escape the area of immediate danger and find safety. The best way to ensure your emergency equipment is up to standard is to purchase equipment tested and certified by the U.S.government.
By its very nature, any HRC plan must be simple enough for everyone to understand and execute. At the same time, the plan needs to be rigid enough to withstand a situation full of variables, including: panic and mob mentality, unavailable exits, corrupted or shifting building infrastructure,and visibility and problems with the building’s air quality. Human resource continuity planning is time-consuming to piece together and implement for an office environment, but even the most resourceful manager can be thoroughly lost in times of crisis without one.
Even the best evacuation plan can and will have problems when faced with so many unknowns and variables. Monthly or quarterly fire drills can help, but in panic situations, it’s best that evacuees have the tools necessary to get out of a dangerous, life-threatening circumstance quickly and safely. Having American-certified smoke and fire escape hoods made available during an evacuation can help neutralize many of the variables found in an emergency situation, especially with air quality and visibility. However, many of the products in the market today are not certified to any standard. If an HRC plan is tested for efficacy, how can an emergency manager ensure that an escape hood will be effective?
Confusion over escape hood options is very real. After 9/11, the marketplace was flooded with a number of different products that touted safety during an escape situation. In 2007, responding to a marketplace glut of questionable products, the Consumer Product Safety Commission tested a number of off-the-shelf escape products. Not one of these products passed the test.
Setting the Standard
In light of the many sub-standard products on the market, an American ANSI/ISEA Standard 110 was established. This new ANSI/ISEA standard defines both test criteria and approval methods. It contains general requirements for certification – including ISO registration for the manufacturer, independent process and quality control audits, as well as follow-up inspection programs – and a comprehensive schedule of performance requirements and associated test methods.
Certified Solutions
To earn certification, the product must meet specified requirements for physical characteristics, including:
- Ease of donning, a full field of vision, exposure to vibration, puncture and tear, as well as extremes of pressure and temperature.
- Being tested with a series of chemical gases, including: carbon monoxide, hydrogen cyanide, sulfur dioxide, hydrogen chloride, acrolein and cyclohexane. These gases include those that are toxic byproducts of combustion and those that are effective indicators of performance against an entire class of gases.
Escape hoods incorporated into an evacuation plan should be certified by the Safety Equipment Institute (SEI), which tests thousands of safety and protective products. SEI currently certifies all NFPA 1981 self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) used in the fire and emergency services.
Consider the Filter
Arguably, the most important part of the escape hood is the filtering system. Although it is possible to identify certain gases and particles as likely hazards in a fire escape situation, it is important to have a filtering system that is effective against specific hazards. The most effective escape hoods will need a combination filter to remove a wide range of particulates and gases.
The best particulate filter is a high-efficiency particulate air HEPA filter. These will filter 99.97 percent or better of sub-micron particles out of the air.
The best gas filter will contain a catalyst and impregnated activated charcoal. The catalyst is essential for turning toxic carbon monoxide, the number one cause of deaths during a fire, into non-toxic carbon dioxide. The impregnated activated charcoal works in tandem with the catalyst, removing toxic gases from the air and mitigating the effects of harmful gases generated by burning materials during a fire.
Incorporating American-certified escape hoods into an HRC plan in an office or building can minimize the number of fatalities and injuries resulting from smoke inhalation and visibility issues during an emergency situation. However, the product needs to have proven efficacy before it can be added to any plan, meaning that only escape hoods certified by SEI to the ANSI/ISEA 110 should be considered. The fire escape hoods that have been certified to this American standard can be found on SEI’s Web site, http://www.seinet.com.
Just as an emergency situation is not the time nor place to ad-lib an escape plan, it is also no place to determine whether a product can live up to its claims. When planning for the human side of business continuity and any potential environmental emergency, it is important that any emergency escape equipment be readily available, integrated into a well thought out HRC plan, and be tested and approved by a respected certification body. Like any planning process, a little research and effort in the early stages will pay huge dividends in the event of any emergency situation and may mean the difference between life and death.
“Evaluation of Consumer Personal Protective Equipment: Emergency Escape Masks, October 2007” and “Human Factors Analysis of Consumer Personal Protective Equipment: Emergency Escape Masks, October 2007”