999 Fire Prevention Guides

Fire prevention at home, offices or industrial plants should really begin at the very beginning i.e. during the conceptual planning stages of a particular housing, commercial or industrial project. Fire prevention should not be considered as a mere facelift which may be superficially attached at the final stage or making the project look more complete.

Most planners would leave the fire prevention task to engineering consultants and there is no doubt that these are the correct personnel to engage in design, construction and commissioning of physical fire prevention facilities. Unfortunately, more often than not these personnel are not the first parties with whom planners make the initial contacts at the very earliest stage of a planned project. It is at these initial encounters that the question of fire prevention should really first be raised, at least for the basic concept.

The property owners could for example be introduced to and perhaps be stimulated to think about such elements as the need for fire prevention to safeguard his life and investment, its long-term benefits versus its initial costs and even his moral obligation to the community in relation to fire prevention.

When the approving body is involved, the property owner would be in a better position to be able to plan in advance his overall funding strategies and schedules to include the provision of fire prevention and not having to have suddenly deal with it as an added construction cost at a later stage.

In addition, he may be more encouraged to accept the role which fire prevention could play in safeguarding his investment in the long term and last but not least, he is given greater awareness of his obligations towards various mandatory requirements by the authorities in providing minimum levels of fire prevention in his planned residential, commercial or industrial development.

The importance of maintenance in providing effective fire protection system cannot be more strongly stressed as they generally employ a complex array of mechanical and electrical systems, subjected to deterioration from weather and age, wear and tear and breakdown or failures from use or even non-use. Regular and proper testing, servicing and maintenance of these equipment are really the only means currently available to ensure that they will perform at such reasonable levels as to be of any benefit in an actual fire situation.

In this respect, property owners either engage professional fire fighting contractors to carry out the maintenance of fire protection equipment or arrange the work to be done by themselves. The regularity and extent of maintenance program normally depend on the complexity of the equipments or system installed.