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Posted By Brenda H
Sorry, I am sure this has been covered before, but did a search and couldn't find what I was looking for...
With regards to general fire risk assessments for buildings.
Where we own our buildings, generally 2-3 story buildings, I am happy to do a risk assessment for the building, i.e. rooms etc.
But what about the ceiling voids/loft spaces etc that I can't see?
Whilst I am happy to conduct an assessment of the general working areas, I wouldn't feel comfortable looking at ceiling areas or roof spaces and incorporating these areas.
Is it expected? Who would do it?
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Posted By J Knight
Hi Brenda,
Depending on the size, nature and function of your building I would say that some sort of evaluation of the fire hazard posed by voids of any sort must form part of your risk assessment. Fires can start in voids, and they can spread in them, so without an understanding of how or whether your voids will help to contain or limit fire you really can't carry out a suitable and sufficient assessment. If you are not comfortable about doing this yourself you need to speak to somebody who understands buildings and how they behave in fires,
John
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Posted By andyp
I too conduct fire risk assessments throughout a number of our company premises without looking into areas such as roof space, voids, beam structures etc.
Whilst i appreciate that considering such aspects of an assessment would make for a more complete overview, a recent visit from our local fire brigade officer concluded that the fire risk assessments in place were of a suitable nature, and were deemed to be thorough.
An area that i personally found helpful in conjunction with the assessments was the development of individual departmental drawing plans, incorporating nearest emergency exits, fire extinguishers & also routes of escape.
Hope this helps
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Posted By J Knight
Andy,
It does depend on what the building is used for; where there are high-risk activities such as hot work, or where people sleep in the building I believe that investigating voids is unavoidable (no pune intended),
John
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Posted By stevehaigh
I put into the assessment that the area could not be assessed at the time of the assessment and it is recommended that a competent surveyor should look at the fire precautiopns in the space if the information is not available off plan
Steve
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Posted By Brenda H
Thanks, J Knight what you say is exactly what i'm thinking and I agree that without looking at what's in the loft, so to speak, the assessment is not fully conclusive.
I definitely would not consider myself 'familiar' enough with buildings and how they behave in fire's to incorporate this aspect in the assessment.
Generally we are probably low risk, the premises are not used to sleep in and there are no hot works. It is mail office/depot accommodation used to store small amounts of product, i.e. some chemicals and tools.
The local fire headquarters is just up the road from us so I might make a visit once I have done an assessment to see if they think it is sufficient.
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