Save lives with smart evacuation systems
2022-03
Smart Solutions from Reality - No. 1
Smart Solutions from PartnerSec
Welcome to our new series of “Smart Solutions From Reality”. In this series of articles, we share experiences from projects we have delivered to one of our clients. We hope that these experiences can help you and your organization solve various problems in smart ways with our products.
In this first “Smart Solution From Reality”, we will look at how one of our clients protects both employees and visitors during an evacuation using the evacuation system included in our APV platform (Access Control System, Payment System, and Visitor Management System). The evacuation system is an active part of the cloud-based visitor management system CavVisit and the cloud-based access control system CampTrac.
Issue - Distrust in Alarms and Challenges with Follow-up
Scenario: One of our clients is responsible for all individuals present in their premises, and during alarms, they want to ensure that everyone understands that the alarm applies to them and that immediate evacuation should occur.
The problem is that there is currently a distrust in fire alarms (and other alarms), causing many individuals hearing the alarm to not believe it applies to them. As a result, they may stay in place when they hear the alarm or not evacuate quickly enough. Due to this distrust in alarms, it is crucial for our client to make it clear to EVERYONE they are responsible for that the alarm applies to them, ensuring immediate evacuation.
The client has clear fire safety rules stating that all individuals present in their premises are their responsibility as long as they are within their premises. During a fire or other danger, the client must know exactly who is present in the premises, promptly warn them, and be able to contact them quickly and easily.
The client’s premises are in a multi-story building, and they use three floors. Within their floors, all employees can move freely, and visitors are restricted to certain areas. When the fire alarm goes off, all individuals on these three floors must be notified to evacuate the building in an organized manner and report that they are safe.
Send Personal Messages to Everyone
They contacted us with the request to have an automatic evacuation system where everyone (employees and visitors) is individually notified that an evacuation is taking place and they should be guided to the assembly point, as well as to report their own status so that the main responsible person can ensure that everyone is safe. The purpose is to ensure that everyone understands that the alarm concerns them (that it is not a false alarm) so that they can evacuate quickly and report that they are safe at the assembly point.
The Smart Solution - The Automatic Evacuation System
In case of an alarm, all employees and visitors in the building are notified via SMS that the alarm concerns them and that they should evacuate. The SMS is personalized and includes their full name to grab attention. The SMS contains a brief message with information on how to reach the assembly point and an individual web link (a unique link per person). When they click on the link, each person is directed to their unique page where they are to report their status.
In addition to their individual SMS messages, the main responsible person and fire safety responsible persons also receive notifications with links to interactive lists where they can see the status of all employees and visitors. When an employee or visitor updates their status, the interactive lists are updated in real-time. They use these lists to call individuals who have not reported their status (phone numbers are visible in the lists) and can update the status of each individual until all persons have an updated, correct status.
All employees pass card readers connected to the cloud-based access control system CampTrac, thus their presence on the premises is registered. All visitors register in the cloud-based visitor management system CavVisit. All vehicles pass cameras that read license plates, and their drivers are registered in the CavVisit visitor system. Thanks to the unique integration between these systems, the customer gains an overview of all individuals in the building and on the premises.
The results
The automatic evacuation system has ensured that the customer has done everything they can, using automatic tools, to ensure that all individuals in their premises are made aware that the alarm concerns them and that they should evacuate.
The system provides the responsible parties with the best possible tool to know exactly who was in the premises when the alarm went off and have complete lists of individuals in the premises with their contact information.
This tool is an excellent complement to audible evacuation alarms, fire alarms, and other means used to ensure that evacuation occurs in the best possible manner.
Which products were used to solve this?
To deliver this solution, we have utilized the cloud-based visitor management system CavVisit and the cloud-based access control system CampTrac.
