Means of Escape

Means of escape covers everything that determines whether people can get out: the routes available, how far someone has to travel to reach one, how well the route is protected from the fire, how many people it can carry, and how the final exits discharge to a place of safety.

Protection and travel distance

A route matters only if it remains usable while it is needed. That is why escape routes are protected by fire-resisting construction and self-closing fire doors, and why travel distances are limited — the further someone has to go, the longer the route has to hold.

Where it goes wrong day to day

Most defects found on escape routes are operational rather than structural. Stored stock, deliveries left in corridors, propped fire doors, furniture narrowing a route, and locked or obstructed final exits are all common, and all of them reduce a designed provision to something less than was intended.

Capacity and occupancy

Capacity was calculated for an assumed occupancy. Where a building's use has intensified — more desks, more residents, a change of use — the original calculation may no longer hold, and that is a question for the fire risk assessment rather than something to be resolved on site.