The LWF Blog

Fire Engineering Design and Risk Assessment – Fire Safety Management – Part 20

March 16, 2020 1:59 pm

In LWF’s Fire Engineering blog series for Architects and others involved in building design, we have been looking at those activities of a company which can be classed as fire safety management. In part 19, we discussed effective communication and its importance to fire safety management, before continuing to look at fire prevention. In part 20, we continue with fire prevention by considering those fire prevention tasks a Fire Safety Manager will find themselves dealing with.

Some of the fire prevention tasks a Fire Safety Manager will undertake are:

– Monitoring the behaviour of occupants to eradicate and mitigate any behaviour which might lead to a fire starting.
– Monitoring a no smoking policy and ensuring it is followed.
– General housekeeping good practice.
– Routines are put into place to ensure the appropriate and timely disposal of waste.
– Working to minimise the hazards of combustible contents, furnishings and surface finishes present in the building.
– Minimising materials, components and elements of any construction work.
– Avoidance of the conditions which might lead to gas and dust explosion hazards.
– Maintenance of furniture, furnishings, décor and equipment.
– Risk Assessment and review of fire hazards, e.g. how a fire might start, spread and consequences.
– Responsibility for routine checks, inspection, tests and maintenance of equipment capable of causing fires, including heat-generating equipment, potential chafing of cables, self-heating and fuel supplies.
– Ensuring those systems integrated with fire safety systems, such as ventilation, are in good working order.
– Risk assessing any proposed changes to equipment, business processes or new technologies.
– The issuing of work permits for any on-site work undertaken and assessing potential fire risk.
– Fire safety training and education programmes.
– Establishing and monitoring out of hours inspection and security procedures.
– Overall security of the premises.

While each of the tasks falls under the remit of the Fire Safety Manager, it is often the case in larger buildings and complexes that teams of staff under their control will work to cover all the possible areas of hazard. Regular inspections should be made and the results logged in the fire safety manual. This allows any problems and remedial actions required to be stated and necessary actions taken.

In part 21, LWF will continue looking at the tasks of the Fire Safety Manager in more detail. In the meantime, if you have any questions about this blog, or wish to discuss your own project with one of our fire engineers, please contact us.

Lawrence Webster Forrest has been working with their clients for over 25 years to produce innovative and exciting building projects. If you would like further information on how LWF and fire strategies could assist you, please contact the LWF office on 0800 410 1130.

While care has been taken to ensure that information contained in LWF’s publications is true and correct at the time of publication, changes in circumstances after the time of publication may impact on the accuracy of this information.