When Construction Disables a Safety System

Taking a sprinkler zone out of service for an afternoon is routine construction and, in an occupied clinical area, it removes a life safety system from people who cannot evacuate quickly. The measure that compensates for that absence is not paperwork, it is the actual protection during those hours.

The other reason this is different from ordinary construction is duration. An impairment on a commercial fit-out lasts an afternoon and affects people who can leave. In a clinical area it may last days and affects people who cannot, which is why the compensating measure has to be genuinely equivalent rather than nominal.

A person with no other duties, patrolling the affected area on a defined route at a defined interval, with a means of raising the alarm and a written record of each patrol. It is not somebody nearby who has been told to keep an eye out.

Where sprinkler protection or detection is out of service in an occupied clinical area, that is what replaces it. Treating it as a formality is how an impairment becomes an incident.

1. 01Plan every system interruption with the facility in advance.
2. 02Provide compensating measures for the whole duration.
3. 03Maintain egress absolutely — it is never traded for convenience.
4. 04Firestop every penetration properly, not temporarily.
5. 05Document each impairment and its restoration.

Firestop penetrations as you go, not at the end. Above-ceiling work in a healthcare facility puts holes through rated barriers continuously, and a facility that gets caught up on firestopping at closeout will not find every one of them.

All 6 →