Over recent weeks I have been researching this issue more intensively and I still can not find the answers that I believe are fundamental to this issue.
I will outline the facts again relating to Means of Escape from buildings.
1. The ground floor main entrance will ALWAYS be the primary means of escape.
2. New buildings will have a hard wired smoke alarm system. This is brilliant as it gives early warning to the occupants that there is a potential fire and alerts them that they need to escape - hopefully safely via the primary means of escape.
3. The upper floors of a property must have a secondary means of escape. This is either by way of fire escape windows i.e. a window with a clear opening of 0.33m2 which enables a fully grow adult easy exit. In buildings with two or more upper floors the fire escape window rule still applies but this is further enhanced with fire doors - which in theory give the occupants ample time to make escape down the stairs to the primary escape route.
The above is all brilliant but as is the case with some regulations it does not take into account what happens in real life.
If you are in the unfortunate position of a fire starting in your home the chances are that you will be in bed. This means that you will in all probability be upstairs. When the smoke alarm goes off there is a chance that the primary escape route will be blocked. If not then you make escape down the stairs and out of the door. If it is you make your way to the escape window. At this point you have two choices - wait for the fire service or exit the window.
Most upper floor windows are 4.5 metres or higher. The regulations actually deem it acceptable to exit a window from this height. Just look out of a window now and ask yourself if you would want to get yourself and your family out of the window and down to the ground. My thought is that you would be a little worried about this.
BUT - someone - and this is the point deems it acceptable to do this. THey say that if you go out backwards and hang from the cill you can then drop safely to the floor. Have a look at the image in this and let me know what you think.
Now lets take this a step further and consider a 3 storey property - fitted with fire doors to give a safe exit in the event of a fire. I have a number of friends who live in these properties and without exception they have gone out to but some wedges because they are sick of the fire doors automatically shutting all the time. I would also guess that not all of these wedges are removed at night which therefore makes the fire door useless and leaves them in the same position of having to exit from a first or even second floor window in the event of a fire.
The simple question I would ask is why does the person who deems it acceptable to exit a building safely from 4.5 metres or Higher not also see these facts. If I where to be lucky enough to be able to get myself into the position shown above the one worry I would have is that I would catch my feet on the lower cill and topple backwards onto my head.
Would a fire escape ladder not be a reasonable addition to the regulations. In the majority of cases the answer would undoubtedly be yes. Not suitable for all eventualities we know but then the current regs are not suitable for all. For example if I was disabled I would not be able to get out of a first floor window anyway and would have alternative safety measures in place.
I would welcome some feedback on this issue and also if you feel as I do why not sign our e petition to make this issue more widely known
http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/18099
Safe means of escape should be a right for all.
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