Dräger, a pioneer in the fields of medical and safety technology, is calling for fire escape hoods to become part of any fire safety plan where evacuation takes more than a couple of minutes – including educational facilities, hospitals, hotels and high-rise buildings.
Fire escape hoods are designed to provide wearers with crucial minutes of protection from fire-related vapors, particles and gases, including carbon-monoxide. Dräger’s PARAT smoke hood range provide wearers with up to 15 minutes of protection.
According to the UK Government, nearly one in three (30%) of fire-related fatalities are the result of being ‘overcome by gas or smoke’, which makes fumes a fire’s most deadly killer.
Fire safety evacuation
Dräger believes it is essential that fire escape hoods are used as a supplementary support
Dräger, therefore, believes it is essential that fire escape hoods are used as a supplementary support to other fire safety evacuation measures, e.g. fire doors and disabled refuge areas.
Indeed, the Fire Door Inspection Scheme (FDIS) recently found in a study of more than 100,000 fire door inspections that three in four, or 75% of all fire doors failed to meet required standards.
Buildings that had the highest number of fire door inspection failures included healthcare buildings, local authorities and housing associations, and private housing, but across the board the research supports the need for supplementary fire safety measures.
Fire safety measures
Ian Gil-Rodriguez of Dräger Safety UK, says the Industry has a responsibility to promote the increased use of fire escape hoods, “The fact that Fire and Rescue Services globally and in the UK are now using fire escape hoods is evidence of their critical importance,” he says.
Ian Gil-Rodriguez adds, “Our Industry needs to come together and join forces to push this change, for the good of public safety. Fire Escape Hoods should be a standard component of evacuation plans, a complementary part of the complicated puzzle, as opposed to a standalone solution.”