Type of Office Emergency - Essay Sample

Introduction

Office fires can strike unexpectedly and cause great financial and material loss to the organization. Office fire emergencies can either be unintentionally caused or intentionally caused. Unintentionally, office fire emergencies can be caused by electrical equipment faults, unattended cooking fire in the office, smoking materials, and faulty wiring (Gernay, Selamet, Tondini and Khorasani, 2016). Sometimes office fire emergencies can be intentionally done by arsonists for their gain. In order to avert the potential loss as a result of fire emergencies in the office, a comprehensive office fire emergency plan is created in advance, and it is operationalized in the organization to ensure loss is minimized, and no casualty is suffered. It is the responsibility of the office management to create a fire emergency plan and ensure all employees in the office have conceptualized it and can adopt it in the event of a fire emergency. The office manager can also conduct periodical mock fire drills to ensure all office employees are responsive to the fire emergency plan.

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Measures of Personal Preparedness

On a personal level, each of the office staff has to have a measure of fire preparedness to ensure disaster does not adversely affect them and their properties. First, all employees in the office have to be aware of the sound of the smoke alarm. The smoke alarm is the first signal of fire in the office, and when it rings, all people in the office should get out of the office immediately (Gernay et al., 2016). If an employee is not aware of the smoke alarm sound, they may not move out of the office early enough, leading to causalities. Secondly, all office employees have to be aware of all premise's exit doors. That is, in the event the fire originates from the main exit, the employees can use the other exit doors to get out of the office premises. The third is each staff should keep important information or documents in fireproof safes all times to minimize loss of critical information in the event of a fire. Forth is that each employee should know the fire brigade and 9-1-1 number to call in case of a fire emergency. Fifth, all employees need to know the stop, drop, and roll rule in the event one's clothes catch fire.

Measures of Facility Preparedness

The office facility has to comply with fire prevention and preparedness guidelines. First, the premises or facility must be fitted with sufficient smoke or fire detectors and alarms. The fire alarms must be periodically checked to ensure they are functional, and their batteries are replaced on a yearly basis (Kim and Han, 2018). Secondly, the office should have firefighting equipment to put off small fires, which, if unattended, can cause great loss. The equipment includes fire extinguishers, fire blankets, and water rills to put off small office fires. The fire fighting equipment needs to be periodically checked and tested to ensure they are in working condition. The office has to have more than one exit door to ensure easy exit from the office in the event of a fire emergency. A single exit is not recommended since in the event the fire originates from the place where there is the exit, then there is a high chance of casualties and death.

Measures of Local or State Preparedness

The local and state governments also have a role in preparing for fire-related disasters. First, the local and state governments are tasked with the creation and monitoring of the implementation of fire prevention and management. Through the urban planning department, the local and state governments ensure buildings are designed and built-in line with fire prevention and management (Kim and Han, 2018). Secondly, the local and state governments have a fire department that is tasked with assisting put off fire. The local and state governments procure both small scale and large-scale firefighting equipment to deal with any kind of fire emergencies. The local and state governments also provide free fire training to individuals and organizations to equip many people with fire preparedness and management skills. On a periodical basis, the local and state governments indulge in fire training and conducting mock fire drills to assess the level of fire emergency preparedness in some government buildings.

What to do in the Event of Fire Emergency

There are two main things to do in the event of a fire disaster in the office. First is evacuating the building. Moving out of the building is the first and important thing to do in the event of a fire emergency. It is important to live behind any personal property and get out of the office as fast as possible (Gernay et al., 2016). The second thing to do is call the police and fire department. Calling 911 can be done immediately one is out of the building to notify the police and fire department to come to assist put off the fire.

Follow-up measures in the Event of Fire Emergency

Most organizations have a designated fire assembly area where in the event of a fire emergency, all employees evacuate the office and assemble at the fire assembly point. At the fire assembly point, a headcount of all office employees is done to ascertain who is missing. A report of the fire incident and employee position is made by the office manager, and a brief debrief can be done to the office staff on the position of office resumption.

References

Gernay, T., Selamet, S., Tondini, N., & Khorasani, N. E. (2016). Urban Infrastructure Resilience To Fire Disaster: An Overview. Procedia engineering, 161, 1801-1805.

Kim, J. K., & Han, D. H. (2018). A Study of Introducing Virtual Reality for Fire Disaster Preparedness Training. The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology, 4(1), 299-306.