Rank: New forum user 
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Hi all, having a bit of conflict of opinion on this one. In producing an FRA for a building site (open outdoor space around a new, unoccupied building), an argument has developed around the final exits through the external hoarding (10-15m from the building), and whether these doors / gates are subject to the same rules as the final exits from the building itself, as in 'should, wherever possible, open outwards'. Guidance on this seems to be limited to FRA's for the inside of buildings, has anyone any experience of applying this to an outside space, or know where guidance can be found?
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Rank: Forum user 
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Alex, Generally speaking, fire risk assessors consider a safe distance from the burning building (a place of total safety) to be at least a minimum of 20m from the building. As such, a hoarding at 15m is not considered sufficiently distant from the building for an assembly point. Therefore, the gates/doors through the hoarding form part of the escape route for the building, and as such have to be of sufficient size to accommodate all the potential users of the route, and ideally open in the direction of travel (SFRP). These will be treated as any other external gate on an escape route. Even if the new building is unoccupied, if people are still working in the building (finalising the fitout for example) it should have an FRA, and this assessment should have identified and assessed the hoarding entrances as part of the means of escape section of that assessment. You are quite correct that there is very little, if any guidance relating to escape routes from external areas. This is basically due to RR(FS)O not applying to external areas. However, a general rule of thumb, is that if the people within an external area are likely to leave in panic (the exits are all close to the potential source of the fire) then the exit should ideally open in the direction of travel. If, however, the exit is further from the possible fire, and alternative exits are available, then the bulk of the people will leave by that/those routes and will not be in (as much of a) panic, so the need for exits to open in the direction of travel is less important. It is all risk assessment-based. Hope it helps,
Tony.
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 2 users thanked antbruce001 for this useful post.
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Rank: Super forum user 
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I think you should consider if the hoarding is a Place of Safety, and when the doors open could they affect anyone walking past outside. if so you can make a lobby for the doors to open into or install a barrier on the outside preventing pedestrians or traffic coming too close.
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1 user thanked firesafety101 for this useful post.
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