Culture of safety

I give space in today's column to a reader who sent me an email about my January 13 article on the fire safety standards of high-rise buildings.

The reader who identified himself as Leonardo Santiago, fire safety specialist, referred my attention to Rule 10, Chapter 2, Division 5 (Means of Egress - Smoke-proof Enclosures) of the Implementing Rules and Regulations of Republic Act 9514 or the Fire Code of the Philippines of 2008.

This provision of the fire safety code answers my earlier question about existing safety standards for fire exit ways. According to the code's IRR, "A smokeproof enclosure shall be enclosed from the highest point to the lowest point by barriers having 2-hour fire resistance ratings. Where a vestibule is used, it shall be within the 2-hour-rated enclosure and shall be considered part of the smokeproof enclosure."

An emergency exit hallway is an example of a vestibule. Doors of these hallways are required by law to be self-closing and designed to minimize air leakage. There are also specific requirements for these enclosures' natural or mechanical ventilation, stair pressurization, and emergency power supply system.

I thank Mr. Santiago for his worthwhile inputs, and hopefully we can tap the expertise of fire safety specialists like him in implementing our fire safety code and in improving existing building safety regulations.

Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña has announced the other day that he will be inviting experts who can help the city identify the best ways to improve the firefighting capability of high-rise buildings.

Cebu City South District Representative Rodrigo Abellanosa has also recently filed a bill in the House of Representatives that seeks to require owners of high-rise buildings to provide emergency escape hoods for building occupants in the event of a fire. The device is designed to provide momentary protection from smoke and fumes to building occupants while they exit from a burning building.

Abellanosa's proposal will likely undergo further study especially on its practicality in certain circumstances, but it is a sensible idea. Because an escape hood is not cheap, it may be impractical, for example, to provide one for each person in the building.

But having a number of these escape hoods and smoke masks will be a big help to in-house responders, and will greatly increase the chances of survival of people with disability, pregnant women, and the elderly.

Lacking from this current discourse on fire safety standards, however, is the need to re-examine our current policies and practices in regard to creating a strong culture of safety. Fostering a culture of safety is not the job of government regulators alone. The private sector can also do a lot in this regard.

With the advances in information technology, government and non-governmental safety organizations, for instance, can develop a mobile app that will enable either government regulators or professional safety inspectors to conduct random safety inspections on some buildings. The results of their observations, which should be based on specific metrics, can then be made available online for people to monitor. A building safety rating system can also be made around this application.

Currently, our perception of a building's safety mainly relies on incident rates –number and severity of accidents, fire incidents, and victims. In the absence of specific indicators, we are not really aware about the level of safety of the building we are in except for the fleeting thought that it has passed fire safety inspection.

But when building managers know that their structure and safety protocols are being rated publicly based on specific indicators, that will likely help promote a sustainable culture of safety –not the safety consciousness that surfaces only from time to time after a disaster strikes.

Real-time or recurrent metric-based ratings will also lead to building occupants and tenants demanding more accountability in the form of corrective measures from building owners or managers. Rewards may also be given as an incentive to building owners who perform excellently in making their buildings safe.

With just a few simple yet innovative steps, Cebu can take its high-rise boom as an opportunity to lead the way in creating a strong culture of building safety in the country. [email protected]