Compliant fire doors save the day at care home

Posted on March 27, 2015

A fire this month at a Hampshire care home, which caters for vulnerable adults, could have caused fatalities had the fire doors not been firmly secured, according to firefighters called to the scene.

The fire started in a tumble dryer in the home’s laundry room. Fire doors, which had been installed and closed correctly, ensured that the fire did not spread throughout the property and was contained to the room of origin.

The Fire Station Watch Manager said: ‘The incident could have been a lot worse if fire doors either end of the corridor had not been firmly secured. The fact the fire doors did their job meant no smoke or flames were allowed to travel out of that area. If they had been open, we could have been looking at a much different situation . . . we could have been looking at fatalities as well.’

According to the Fire and Rescue Services in England, care homes are considered to represent the highest risk from fire. Since January this year there have been three fatal fires in UK care homes, and this latest incident highlights how important the proper management of fire doors is. Wedging doors open, even for a short while, is not only illegal but highly dangerous. Without question, fire doors play a critical role in fire safety. Yet, paradoxically, they can be seen as a barrier to the free flow of people in a building – a contradiction of their true function to prevent the spread of smoke and fire.

Geofire’s Agrippa range of wire-free fire door holders and ‘swing-free’ closers are the perfect compliant solution to the problem of holding open fire doors to ease access throughout a building, closing them in the event of a fire emergency to protect a building’s occupants.

The Agrippa range is the first of its kind on the market that uses proven digital wire-free technology to uniquely ‘listen and learn’ the sound of a specific fire alarm, so false activations are virtually eliminated. They are wire-free, compact and easy to fit. They can be programmed for timed daily release, and are approved to EN1155, and CE Marked.