With an evacuation plan, you ensure that an evacuation proceeds in a structured manner; without panic and without casualties. However, an evacuation plan does not always guarantee a successful outcome. After all, it is a more or less static plan with fixed escape routes, while incidents rarely proceed according to plan…
Naturally, your organization has defined all possible risks on paper and elaborated the various scenarios, including the best escape routes for those scenarios. The emergency response organization knows exactly what to do in these situations, and evacuation drills are conducted regularly. For many organizations, this is sufficient. However, where greater risks exist, where chemical substances are handled, where there are immensely large industrial sites, or a risk of a terrorist or activist attack, a different approach is often necessary.
If a toxic gas cloud hangs over your large industrial organization, it is questionable whether evacuation should even occur. Staying indoors might be safer under these circumstances. If you are dealing with a shooter on your outdoor premises, your personnel should certainly not go outside. They could easily end up directly in the shooter’s line of fire… If a visitor to your cinema becomes unwell in one of the halls? Then it suffices to evacuate only that hall and burden the rest of the visitors as little as possible with (the consequences of) the incident.
These examples immediately clarify that responding to an incident requires a tailored approach; both for follow-up and for the decision of whether and how to evacuate. Dynamic evacuation, then. But how do you do that?
Gather reliable information
To make the right decisions, reliable information about the nature, location, and severity of the incident is essential. The more accurate the information about the incident, the greater the chance that your emergency response personnel will make the correct decisions.
There are several ways to collect this information.
Investigation by Emergency Response Personnel
In buildings that are not excessively large, your own emergency response personnel can investigate themselves after an incident report. They then see exactly what is happening and where; they are ‘situationally aware’. Based on this information, they can now make the correct decisions and initiate corresponding actions.
Personnel at Incident Location
Additionally, there are Incident Response Management systems, such as NowForce, that you can use to gather information. In an app, the incident reporter, responders/first aid personnel, security personnel, and operators in a control room or crisis center can share all relevant information with each other. Based on the information thus gathered, possibly in combination with live footage from security cameras, your emergency response or crisis organization can make the correct decisions.
PSIM – Physical Security Information Management software
Furthermore, you can utilize the available information from security and business systems. Especially when you have PSIM software (Physical Security Information Management), this will yield highly reliable information. A PSIM collects, filters, and interprets data from all these systems and databases and presents you only the information that is relevant (at that moment) and pertinent to the incident. This provides you with a clear picture of the situation on-site and prevents an overload of information.
From information to action
As soon as you have sufficient (relevant and reliable) information about the incident (severity, location, development), you can decide whether a complete or partial evacuation is necessary or if other measures should be taken. This is separate from the necessary follow-up by emergency services. Depending on the incidents you anticipate, you set up your alarm organization and acquire systems with which you can instruct the people in your organization during an incident. Depending on the chosen system, your personnel can be warned with an evacuation signal or via spoken instructions. See the various options below.
Evacuation signal for standard evacuation
If you want to initiate a standard evacuation (and therefore want all people out of the building via the known escape routes), it is obvious to do this with the standard evacuation signal from the evacuation alarm system.
Evacuation Signal supplemented with Spoken Instructions
If you expect that additional, flexible instructions are needed, for example, because a certain escape route is unavailable, a Type A evacuation system (spoken word) with a command microphone is required. Via the microphone, you can then provide scenario-specific information to the people in the building.
Variable evacuation signal
If you have already worked out different evacuation scenarios in advance for different types of incidents, you can also choose to have a different signal or spoken instruction for each evacuation scenario. This only works if the emergency response organization is extremely well trained and evacuations are routinely practiced. After all, the employees now need to know which signal stands for which type of evacuation. In general, we only see this in large industrial organizations that have a highly professional alarm organization.
Evacuation alarm system as a public address system or warning signal
As we described earlier, in some situations there is no need to evacuate and people should stay inside and perhaps close the windows. For example, if there is a toxic gas cloud. In that case, this instruction should also be shared with the people in the organization. It doesn’t make sense to use an evacuation signal for this. That would be counterproductive. However, you can now use the evacuation alarm system as a public address system and you can give spoken (customized) instructions to the staff via the command microphone.
Automatic Actions
Depending on the incident, not only do people have to be alerted, but the doors in the escape route must also open (simultaneously). Or close if there is a shooter who is still outside the building. The control of doors, extinguishing systems, emergency services and initiating a possible evacuation can be (partially) automated, depending on the systems you work with. For example, via the aforementioned Incident Response Management system NowForce, all available information can be disseminated to reporters, emergency responders and the personnel present. (Flight) instructions can also be given via the app. And with the push of a button, people can indicate that they are safe, allowing emergency responders to fully focus on the people who are not yet safe at that moment.
If you work with a PSIM solution, many more actions can be automated. You then have the option to include standard procedures and instructions in the software in the form of dynamic step-by-step plans. The step-by-step plans can adapt to the time, the location of the incident or the way in which the situation develops. Your emergency response staff or control room operators will see the step-by-step plans on their dashboard and will be guided through a situation step by step. The software also constantly provides (current) relevant information that can be used to make the right decisions. As a result, there is much less chance of human (interpretation) errors and you can be sure that all necessary actions/actions are carried out and in the right order. Furthermore, all information can easily be shared with others (such as emergency services and service providers from the safety region), so that everyone has the same relevant information.
By linking an Incident Response Management system to a PSIM, you can stay in control of incidents and adequately inform your people on location and, if desired, deploy them for the right response and assistance. Live camera images from people’s smartphones on location are now automatically displayed in the central environment (control room or control room, for example). Thanks to these ‘eyes on the ground’, situations can be better assessed and assistance can be deployed in a targeted manner.
Finally
You don’t just evacuate; It is a heavy tool that disrupts the organization considerably. People can panic and (production) processes come to a standstill. Only when it is really necessary will there be an evacuation and then no more people, buildings or parts of buildings than necessary. But the evacuation must be done in the right way. How? Then depends on the type of incident, the location and the severity. For large, complex organizations where multiple types of incidents are possible, scenario-based or dynamic evacuation is essential. But then you need to be able to base your decisions on reliable information about the incident. Depending on (the size of) your organisation, the emergency response organisation can collect information about the incident itself or you can leave it to intelligent systems.
Applications such as NowForce and a PSIM provide a lot of useful management information in this regard. You can also record all actions, decision-making and other relevant information (such as conversations, actions and camera images) in these systems. You have the opportunity to evaluate whether the right actions have been taken after an incident and to convert the lessons learned into new or adapted procedures and instructions. This information can also be used to increase security awareness in your organization.
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