Disabled DD and fire evacuation.

[Blueyhasstolenmylife]

This is not a dig at the protocol and I do understand why but

DD has moved in to a classroom upstairs now which requires you to go through 2 classrooms and 2 flights of stairs to get to playground.
she has multiple health conditions but can walk however uses a wheelchair when unwell or long distances. She is much slower than her peers. Just like any other place the fire safety protocol means that she is unable to be evacuated until last - then obviously takes her longer to get out after everyone else but she is not allowed to start evacuating until all others are out. I get the protocol I do and I can see it from everyone else prospective just am I being unreasonable that’s it’s another thing I read that reminds me how much more disadvantaged in every day life she is.
I think it’s just more of a rant than anything :(

I thought that people with disabilities, or pregnant or something else that may slow them down wait until the masses have left so they can they leave safely without being pushed and shoved on the way out of the building. Is that not the case?

Our school used to have defined year groups in different bits of the school but they changed to mixing them up when students with wheelchairs joined the school. Ever since they have had one class in each year group downstairs. It works well for students who are temporarily on crutches etc, there's always a downstairs class they can join. And teachers can message each other easily these days. Arguably there isn't the same need to be next door to your year group colleagues as there used to be.

I would have thought she would need a safe place to go upstairs, as a minimum.

Also you 100% need to speak to someone TODAY about how they would evacuate your child in an emergency. I wouldn't leave the building until I knew that. That's terrifying to not know. :(

It is sadly an unfair system but I’m not sure what the alternative is.

My deaf cousin was forgotten about during a fire alarm at her college and had no idea there was an alarm going off - thankfully it was just a test.

Just spoken to my brother who is a fire safety officer at a university - he says:

There has to be a personal emergency evacuation plan (PEEP). They are being negligent if there is not one. This should have been planned with the parent and child in consultation.

A fire safety and risk assessment should have been done

They have a legal duty (Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005) to provide adequate means of emergency escape for all occupants of the building. Without a PEEP it is not certain that adequate means of emergency escape are being met for any disabled staff / students / visitors - remind them of their legal duty.

In the situation described, there should be a refuge for the student to wait in with at least one staff member. This should have communication to whoever would be managing the evacuation. The refuge must be able to provide safety from a fire for the length of time until an individual can be safely evacuated - fire restricting construction should be used . Usually a refuge will be at the head of a protected stairway as this will then allow for exit from the building.

For the evacuation itself, there should be an evac chair available and training completed for the transfer from wheelchair to evac chair. If it is only a short distance on stairs, a carry down procedure might be used but this should have already been identified and practiced.

This should all have been put in place in advance and it is worrying that it was not.

Bless you. I can understand your worry.

They should definitely be getting an evac chair and should have a written and practiced plan (shared with you).

However, I do think it's right that a disabled person evacuates last. If they went first they would be slower which in a chaotic emergency could then cause pushing, shoving and people getting trampled which could harm your child and others.

A horrid situation and it would have made sense to have moved classroom allocation around so her class could have a ground floor classroom.