Fire preplans save assets and lives in highrise structures
Published: 01 April, 2007
There are many reasons why fire departments maintain pre-plans for commercial buildings. Firefighter safety, building familiarisation, code compliance, and regulatory requirements are some of the most common reasons pre-plans are completed. While each of these reasons is important on their own merit, one question begs to be asked. If a pre-plan can address all these issues, why isn’t every fire department completing them?
There are many reasons why fire departments maintain pre-plans for commercial buildings. Firefighter safety, building familiarisation, code compliance, and regulatory requirements are some of the most common reasons pre-plans are completed. While each of these reasons is important on their own merit, one question begs to be asked. If a pre-plan can address all these issues, why isn’t every fire department completing them?
While excuses for not completing pre-plans are many, the truth is any department not completing pre-plans is doing a great disservice to both its firefighters and the public they serve, explains David Howorka, Executive Vice President of RealViewLLC of Chicago, Illinois, US.
“Information provided in the pre-plan can be invaluable to the fire officer in his or her decision process. What is not realised is the potential financial implications that are passed on to the residents because of the lack of pre-plans,” says David.
In the US, the The Insurance Services Office (ISO) collects and provides information to insurance companies on over 45,000 fire districts across the country. The information provided by ISO is used by the insurance companies to calculate insurance premiums. ISO grades a fire department on several different elements including fire alarm and communications, water supply and fire department operations. ISO includes fire pre-plans under the training category.
ISO states “that each fire department should run a pre-fire planning inspection of each commercial, industrial, institutional, and other similar structure twice a year for maximum credit.” Records of the inspections should include complete and up-to-date notes and sketches.
The training portion of the ISO rating schedule accounts for 9% of the total score. Complete fire pre-plans as outlined in the rating schedule will result in getting the maximum points available and thus affecting the overall rating. The better the rating, the less residents will pay in insurance premiums.
“The use of the CommandScope pre-plan program designed by Realview LLC will allow fire departments to realise the maximum points possible for fire pre-plans as outlined by ISO and can include interoperable information required per other regulatory agencies in an easy to use format,” says David Howorka.
RealViewLLC’s CommandScope program was designed with ease-of-use in mind. Even though CommandScope meets the ISO pre-plan requirements, the biggest benefit is allowing firefighters to easily access information so they can make better decisions by having critical information at their fingertips in advance of arriving at an incident.
“The format allows for easy data entry as well as easy information retrieval. Unlike the paper pre-plans that were kept in binders and rarely used by fire crews, CommandScope makes it quick and easy for fire crews to retrieve vital pre-plan information. Fire crews will use this information because of the ease-of-use and instantly-updated information,” concludes David. More information? Visit: www.RealViewLLC.com or www.CommandScope.com
