Means of escape
Requirement B1 of the building regulations requires that when there is a fire, there is both:
- Satisfactory means of sounding an alarm.
- Satisfactory means of escape for people.
Approved document B, Fire Safety, Volume 2, Buildings other than dwellinghouses, defines ‘means of escape’ as:
‘Structural means that provide one or more safe routes for people to go, during a fire, from any point in the building to a place of safety.’
The approved document defines an escape route as ‘The route along which people can escape from any point in a building to a final exit.’ where a final exit is ‘The end of an escape route from a building that gives direct access to a street, passageway, walkway or open space, and is sited to ensure that people rapidly disperse away from the building so that they are no longer in danger from fire and/or smoke.'
NOTE: Windows are not acceptable as final exits.
The approved document sets out ways that means of escape can be provided in commonly-occuring situations.
[edit] Related articles on Designing Buildings Wiki
- Automatic release mechanism.
- Building evacuation.
- Controlled fitting.
- Emergency lighting.
- Escape route.
- Evacuating vulnerable and dependent people from buildings in an emergency FB 52.
- Exit passageway.
- Fire.
- Fire detection and alarm systems.
- Fire door.
- Fire Door Inspection Scheme.
- Fire protection engineering.
- Fire resistance.
- Fire safety design.
- Fire separation.
- Firefighting lift.
- Inner room.
- Installing fire doors and doorsets (GG 86).
- Protected escape route.
- Protected stair v escape stair.
- Storey exit.
- The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005.
- Unprotected escape route.
- Visual alarm devices - their effectiveness in warning of fire.
- Vomitory.
- Wayfinding.
Featured articles and news
Introducing or next Guest Editor Arun Baybars
Practising architect and design panel review member.
Quick summary by size, shape, test, material, use or bonding.
Types of rapidly renewable content
From forestry to agricultural crops and their by-products.
Terraced houses and the public realm
The discernible difference between the public realm of detached housing and of terraced housing.
Put digitalisation and sustainability at the core of curricula
Project management educators are urged.
Looking back at the influence of climate events
From a designer and writer: 'There are limits to growth but no limits to development'.
Terms, histories, theories and practice.
Biophilic design and natural light
Letting in the light and natural elements into spaces.
APM Programme Management Conference 2024
Strategies for Success.
Residential takes the reins as contract awards even out
Contracts down, but remain above the last quarter of 2023.
Celebrating Eid and the largest mud-brick building.
Barry Kingscote claims prestigious CIOB CMYA Award.
The British Mosque: an architectural and social history
The story of some 1,500 mosques or more in Britain.
Heat pump refrigerants, efficiencies and impacts
R12 to R1270 what are the differences?
Global heat pump market in 2023
Challenging times with positive but modest outlook.
Beyond the infrastructure pipeline
Opportunities and chokepoints.