FIRE FIRE or The sky is falling, The Sky Is FALLING
OK Troops load them flamethrowers with Napalm and stand by. I have selected a position, which is not going to be very popular. But first a little background. The current building and fire codes (which we all love) have roots. The reality is I know nothing about these roots, but I am going to spin a parallel tale, that is I am making this all up. This is the story of a Powerful Amusement Park, a weak local municipality And a Dark Attraction. This attraction was a walk through made from trailers. The internal switch back design added to the problem of exits and safe customer egress in case of an emergency. The customers would walk through, looking at the displays and set decorations, no actors. From the outside it looked grand, great facade and entry area, even looked safe. Actually there are two identical attractions with one entry, during peak periods both sides would be opened. Between the two attractions was the entry and control room. One dark day there was a fire and a bunch of people died. End of story. NYET. First lets examine the attraction. It meet no building codes of the modern world, unless there is a part of this planet that specializes in coffins built to look like Dark Attractions. Exits were not to code, no smoke detection equipment, no emergency lighting, no emergency controls (OOPS I forgot the telephone) of any kind. In case of a fire no provision was made for the ventilation system to be shut down. The attraction was installed and leveled and its tires left on the wheels. The interior and exhibits met no flame proofing standards, as they were not flame proofed. The walls were coated with foam rubber to give a cave look. And even with all this said no one should have ever died. This hypothetical case was settled out of court, records sealed and witnesses advised against speaking out. But because I am making this up I will continue the story. Less than two weeks before this make believe fire the local Fire Marshal paid his annual visit. He wrote a report. In it he said any fire here would be very difficult to fight. He failed to mention that the building met no safety standards, oh well its the Powerful Amusement Park, they rule. Gee, I forgot, the staff. The highly trained Amusement Park teenage staff. And now, the two bones I have to pick. Bone one; the unique construction of this attraction could very well have been the first case of anyone dying in a fully sprinkled building, except the building was not sprinkled. The victims of the fire died from smoke inhalation not the fire. And the smoke was extremely deadly. The burning foam rubber created a gas that once inhaled caused disorientation before killing you. Now I am disorientated in a smoke filled maze, gee. The smoldering foam fire was well in advance of the heat wave that would set off the sprinklers (the fire would be put out behind the advancing low heat yield burning foam), couple this with a ventilation system feeding oxygen to the fire and you have dead customers, period. And now we have sprinkled buildings. And if we are not very very careful people will die in them. Bone two is staff. The customers died because of the staff, no other reason. A customer actually informed the staff in the control room that there was a fire. Now I do not know what planet you're from, but we detain such a customer with one hand while we pull the fire alarm with the other. (OOPS, sorry, no fire alarm to pull, oh well) There is no thinking here, there is no option, it is get the customers the HELL out and then check the fire. Well not today, the control room staff sent an observer (with out a fire extinguisher) who indeed came back to the control room and said yep there's a fire. This is a maze; all that time wasted walking around. The case is sealed, the lawsuits settled and paid and we the public are left in the dark. A funky fire report was made and is on file, but hey, its The Powerful Amusement Park. So here we are. I am now ready for the flames. Because I will do my best to see to it that there is some type of certification process for haunt operators and staff, a license maybe. People are injured in haunts all the time, people have died in them. And like air crashes the responsibility falls mostly on pilot's, piolt error. That is, the final responsibility is management's. I have walked through haunts in broad daylight that scared the Hell out of me for all the wrong reasons. I look at the teenage staff (nothing against teens, my son and daughter are) and know that they have not been trained to any standard, have not a clue and think it is neat to scare the bee gee gees out of people. (Well, hell, so do I) So I propose a national standard of some type. A book of knowledge that we can come to some type of an agreement on, and a method of testing staff, actors and management. Accreditation of a type, where cards are issued and levels of training are indicated. A haunt employees pay could be tied to his certification type and level. Displaying an ID card with your photo and achievement levels might give a better impression than "Yeah babe, I work in a Haunted House". In case of an accident or emergency a haunt would look better before a jury when presenting trained staff. And not everyone would be required to have a certification, it is an option. It would also provide legitimacy to our craft. This is one of the reasons I favor an association, it is a formal way to get organized and prepare materials of this nature. And once it is formed I will push this till I turn purple (Barney not withstanding). Knowledge is power, the more you know, as an operator, the more you can and will be prepared for the most unlikely emergency. This knowledge can be obtained via reality, or you can learn it from others that have been there. The difference being learned as you go Vs I know what to do. AND YES I am aware that some of this knowledge is available on the net via Haunt World and Haunted America, but there is no way to know who is/is not reading this information and no way to determine how much has been retained. I would like to see a sign or emblem in front of a haunt that indicates the level of professionalism contained inside, I, the customer, deserve it. And 'Katy Bar the Door' for those that come between my goal and me. Because I see only good, that's all my blinders will let me see. Others will see what others want to see. I can use some guidance that is all. Of course you could (and probably will) try to dissuade me, and for that I promise to stay out of your haunt.Some suggested areas of training
· Evacuation and crowd control · Evacuation and emergency plan design · Fire fighting techniques · CPR and other life saving · Customer management in the haunt · Crowd management · Scare tactics that protect the customer and actor · Haunt communication for safety/security · Haunt design parameters in regards to safety and ease of egress · Natural disaster managementJB Corn
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