Commercial buildings are places that house businesses and such– so, for example, malls, retail shops, hotels, medical centers and office buildings are all commercial buildings. And do these types of buildings often have common safety violations? You bet!
Now if you frequent a commercial building– say you work in one– you want to make sure it’s safe, right? You don’t want to be in a dire situation where there’s a fire, God forbid, and you need to exit quickly but the exits are blocked. Fires, as you know, can spread quickly and they can get out of control. They do a tremendous amount of damage, not only to property but to people’s lives as well.
Common Commercial Building Safety Issues
So what are common fire safety violations in commercial buildings? There are many, and perhaps the main one would be that doors are blocked such that people cannot exit like they’d want to– this could be because piles of boxes are in the way, etc. If exits are blocked then remove items in the way so they’re not blocked– simple, right?
What are some other problems? Well, sometimes emergency exit signs are not lit properly so people can’t see them when they need to… maybe their batteries died or someone broke the sign(s). Ugh. Maybe the alarm system and smoke detectors are faulty and haven’t worked for weeks, months or years. Those things need to be tested and maintained if they’re going to work when you want them to.
Sometimes commercial buildings have fire extinguishers that are missing or damaged. Or buildings get converted from one use to another but not properly updated, so they have mismatched sprinkler systems. What about the buildings which use fire pump or riser rooms as storage closets? Not a good idea! Or when people hang items from fire sprinklers or piping? Again, not smart.
Finally, commercial building managers need to make sure their fire department connections and valves outside the building are not blocked. If they are blocked, how’s the fire department going to do their job? They’re not!
Commercial buildings should be regularly inspected for fire safety violations, and those in charge need to fix the problems before it’s too late.
