How many levels of scrutiny did this have to pass through before it reached us? And nobody spotted the missing "r"? Yeah, I'll trust these people to be on top of the details.

Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com

We don't need no freakin ahhhs

By SwirlyGrrl on Thu, 01/31/2013 - 8:33pm.

It's Bahston. Musta been text to speech.

The BCEC's life safety alert

By datadyne007 on Thu, 01/31/2013 - 8:51am.

The BCEC's life safety alert system is more advanced than typical fire alarms that you may see elsewhere. Many towers and shopping malls employ this new alert system which is based on zoned evacuations rather than a single tone repeating over and over again making the whole building evacuate at the same time. Many people ignore fire alarms the same way they do car alarms.

The system works like this:
- Pull box in zone B is activated.
- Alarms throughout the complex (all zones) sound to get attention.
- The message is played throughout all zones in cycles of 3 alerts. Occupants are informed that if a different tone sounds after the message, then they need to evacuate.
- The evacuation tone sounds in zone B and only zone B or adjacent zones.
- All other zones must remain on standby until they hear the evacuation tone.

Full building evacuations are not always required. This allows first responders to better coordinate evacuations and in towers, prevents massive chaos in stairwells by evacuating by floor.

I worked in a building with one of these

By anon on Thu, 01/31/2013 - 11:24am.

It just created utter confusion. It was a noisy work environment, full of patrons, and it was really hard to ever hear what the Alarm Voice was saying in time to act.

This was compounded by the fact that I had a ton of really clueless supervisors, who would choose to ignore the alarm and insist on evacuating when we weren't supposed to, or insist on staying inside when the alarm told us to get out. Then, sometimes they'd come running through a few times with mixed messages: "Don't evacuate! Evacuate! No, never mind! Evacuate! Wait, why is everyone outside! No, go back outside!"

It got to the point where, if we heard the alarm, we'd kick all the patrons out into the lobby, lock up, and wait for the fire department to give the final order.

The way the system works in my building

By roadman on Thu, 01/31/2013 - 5:36pm.

is this: An alert tone goes out on all floors, followed by a message that indicates a) there is a report of an emergency sonewhere in the building; b) to evacuate only if the evacuation tones sound on your floor after this message; and c) to await further instructions should the evacuation tones not sound on your floor after this message.

In my office (which is on the seventh floor), we quip that c) should be followed by "If the evaculation tones have not sounded on your floor, just ignore that burning sensation you feel underneath your feet. It probably means nothing."

This video is private

By Confimred on Thu, 01/31/2013 - 10:46am.

I think that someone does not want you watching their video anymore.

Helpful video if you've ever wondered when it's time to evacuate the convention center

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