Unfortunately there is no one invention yet that can do that. But a Fire Door is an important part of an overall strategy to hindering the spread of fire.

There is a mandatory requirement to install Fire Resistant Doors in a premise's.

Fire Doors can perform the following functions

A. Hinder the spread of fire, smoke & heat throughout a building

B. Hinder the spread of fire, smoke & heat onto escape routes

C. Provide increase protection to storage areas e.g. data or combustible material

D. Provide a minimum of 30 minutes resistance to fire, smoke and heat to a compartmentalised safe area

1. Types of Fire Door

There are two types of main types of Fire Door:-

Smoke Stop Doors

This type of Fire Door's primary purpose is to provide adequate resistance to the passage of smoke and other combustible products during the early stages of a fire.

Fire Check & Fire Resisting Doors

This type of Fire Door firstly has to fulfil the above requirement of a smoke stop door and secondly is required to provide a barrier to a well-developed fire without permitting fire and excessive quantities of smoke to pass.

The second type is an example of how a standard Fire Door can be modified and upgraded to make it more suitable for use in more high risk areas of a building and to hinder a fire in different ways.

Take for example a small storage room at the far end of a building. It is rarely used and houses some combustible material such as wooden desks if it were an old school. Consider also a room were people work and is more central to the building. It is close to areas where a fire may break out and is possibly on an evacuation route. This more critical and higher risk location would require a better performing fire door than the small cupboard room. One may be needed only to hinder the initial spread of fire to other combustible materials whereas another may be required to protect people from a well-developed fire ensuring escape route integrity is maintained.

Coupled with the modern day construction method of compartmentalisation the above example serves to further demonstrate exactly the necessity of a Fire Door.

Should a fire start in the room we have mentioned, people should sound the alarm and proceed to evacuate along an escape route. With a Fire Door in place the spread of the fire will be hindered allowing emergency services valuable time to arrive and perhaps extinguish the fire before it has a chance to spread.

Should a fire start elsewhere in the building it may compromise the escape route. If no other route is available evacuees could choose to seek sanctuary in a room protected by a Fire Door. Safer in the knowledge that they have a guaranteed 30minutes of protection they can weight for the arrival of the emergency services and eventual rescue.

2. Antiquated Attitudes

For many years the hindrance to free movement posed by a Fire Door has been resented by companies and a business culture, whereby it was acceptable to prop them open, soon developed.

This led to the use of the 'British Standard Wedge' as it came to be known, the Fire Extinguisher. This was an even more dangerous practice as it meant should a small fire occur and someone made the decision to attempt to tackle it upon searching for the extinguisher it may be nowhere to be found!

In the past with the old prescriptive method of Fire Safety, whereby a premise's was inspected annually by the local fire service, an establishment could ensure that Fire Doors where properly used come inspection time. With the risk assessment methodology of the RRFSO, Fire Doors have to be given proper consideration. With the RRFSO the fire service has been given new powers of inspection, this allows unannounced visits to review the premises. Provision of a file of evidence must be made upon an officer's request and contained within it should be information regarding a premise's Fire Doors and how they relate to the overall fire strategy of the building.

3. Recent Prosecutions

The RRFSO is itself not yet as known as it should be with reports of nearly one third of all businesses not aware of their duties under the order(1).

Regardless of whether a business is aware or not this has not stopped prosecutions being sought or brought under the act. Below are some examples of recent headlines relating to Fire Doors.

1. Blaze warehouse owners failed to install safety doors - NOVEMBER 2007

Owners face possible prosecution for manslaughter due to lack of Fire Doors at premises (2)

2. Carpet shop and home furnishing store fined for fire safety risks - APRIL 2008

Company fined for wedging open fire doors (3)

3. Major National Retailer fined over Fire Safety - 2007

Fined £250,000 for Fire Door and other offences (4)

The third is a prime example of where a corporate bias against Fire Doors was exposed and prosecuted under the RRFSO. Offences were present at a number of the chains branches which led to this record fine. As some of the first companies to be prosecuted it is hard to say if companies are being made an example of but it is fair to say that for the sake of a closed door these fines could easily have been avoided.

4. Product Innovation

With the known bias against Fire Doors, the obvious hindrance to free movement but the vital necessity of their protection it was only inevitable that a product would be invented that resolved the contention.

This comes in the form of Automatic Release Mechanism Devices. These hold a Fire Door open at normal times but in an emergency automatically disengage allowing the Fire Door to close itself.

A.R.M. Devices are governed by BS 5839; Part 3. Purchase of a device certified under the standard will be seen as an acceptable method of keeping Fire Doors open at peak use times whilst ensuring that in an emergency this crucial fire safety component is effective.

There are several manufacturers with similar systems implemented in slightly different ways but all should comply with the standard above.

One of the key companies in this market are Fireco.

Their nationwide campaign to 'Kick the Wedge' was a way to highlight the use of A.R.M Devices. Sending the company your illegal fire door wedge meant that they would give you £5's off the purchase of their Dorguard system.

The Dorguard system utilises audio detectors to register the commencement of a fire alarm. Upon doing so it disengages a door stop allowing the door to close itself. It is compliant with the required standards and cheaper than most other A.R.M Devices.

It's has recently been commissioned for use in leading premiership football club Portsmouth's club stadium who have recognised its performance and cost-effectiveness.

They have been installed in busy administrative areas where there is a lot of movement between offices which would lead to frustration having to constantly open and close a series of Fire Doors by many staff thus preventing them from likely eventually being illegally wedged open.

5. An open and shut case

The Fire Door is a good example of how for many years companies have taken fire safety in general for granted. It highlights perfectly the way in which a lack of commitment to safety from a management level quickly filters down to employees and fosters a corporate culture of negligence. With the RRFSO this is set to change. The Fire Door is being recognised as an indispensible tool which when correctly applied to a premise's can greatly increase the level of fire safety. With the severity level of the fines this type of infraction brings consider next time you pass a wedged open Fire Door whether an investment in an A.R.M Device would be wise. Surely its money better spent than on legal costs trying to defend to a judge why it was wedged open in the first place. No lawyer has successfully defended the practice yet and it is likely none ever will.

Confused when it comes to Fire Doors? See the Means of Escape guide.

http://www.means-of-escape.com/fire-resource-centre/guides/

Read the guide? Still have questions? Ask them in our Forum

http://www.means-of-escape.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=8&sid=8e1de18080291b708e2bc3e6b1ef4a4c

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