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Enlightened
So, it was a typical day today in the office... back from the holidays and into the weekly grind with work piling up, meetings and deadlines coming up. My office building is in the heart of the city and is 20 stories and we have our periodic fire drills and warning messages now and again.
I was preparing this afternoon for a meeting when the fire alarm went off in my building. Being one of the fire wardens on my floor, I knew this wasn't a scheduled drill since we don't normally have one when it's -20 degrees c outside! I usually edc a Maratac AAA in my pocket and carry a NC D10 along with a SF 6P w/ M60 in my courier bag so I quickly grabbed both and headed down the hall to talk to my managers.
The announcement came on and said that there was an alarm activated in the P2 parking garage and that we should all be in a hold state so we all waited. 5 minutes later, my manager came around telling everyone to evacuate, which was quickly followed by the announcement over the PA that all 20 floors were to evacuate the building.
I went to my station by the East stairwell and began directing people downstairs when one of my colleagues mentioned that the West stairwell was filled with smoke
and people coming down that stairwell could not see in front of them. I quickly directed one person to make sure they watch the East and I headed to the West stairwell. I felt the door knob - which was cool to the touch - and slowly opened the door to be met with grey... mist / fog. At first, I thought the fire dept must be hosing down a big fire in the garage and that the vapour was traveling up the stairwell but I quickly realized that the "smoke" didn't smell like smoke. It was like a giant steam room in the West stairwell!
I felt that the emergency situation wasn't so bad afterall but I still didn't know the cause - the more pressing situation was that the stairwell was full of people trying to make it down to ground level in a stairwell with steam and they couldn't see 2 feet in front of them. I stood in the doorway with my NC D10 and shone it up the stairwell and told everyone there to exit the stairwell on my floor (5th) and cross over to the other clear stairwell. The D10 had a more narrow beam and less output than my SF 6P w/ M60 so I switched over to my SF 6P and directed it along the wall, up the stairs and yelled up to follow the light to the 5th floor to cross over. You can see some people were on the verge of panic as they couldn't see in front but I was able to tell them that they were almost at the landing and to take their time. They yelled back that they couldn't see a darn thing so I directly my beam up the stairs and told them to head for the light on the 5th floor landing.
I did this for 30 minutes and told one of my fellow wardens to periodically report back to me whether the other stairwell was clear - which it was. Once the final person was out (from what I could tell), I did a final sweep of the floor, exited the building and made my way to our company's rally point.
I finally got the update approx. 20 minutes later that the building had hired a company to complete some renovations in the P2 parking area and apparently some pipe was ruptured causing the steam to escape and up the stairwell. The most disappointing aspect of all of this is that the security personnel in the building, who did discover the steam traveling up about 8-10 stories of the West stairwell, didn't even bother to send anyone to ensure the occupants did not use that stairwell. They simply made an announcement over the PA - only problem is that there are no speakers in the stairwell!!! So, anyone who was already there didn't hear the message, including me.
From a Flashoholic standpoint, I was glad that I had my lights with me and that they were (somewhat) put to the test. My observations: LED lights, while not that great at penetrating steam / fog, did a decent job of projecting a beam of light out approx. 20-30 feet (I also shone it up centre of the stairwell between the railing to direct people), enough that people could see it. Also, both my lights were covered with moisture within 5-10 minutes but worked flawlessly. From the standpoint of the whole situation, I think we were very fortunate it wasn't a fire and no one panicked or was injured while traveling down that stairwell full of steam.
I was preparing this afternoon for a meeting when the fire alarm went off in my building. Being one of the fire wardens on my floor, I knew this wasn't a scheduled drill since we don't normally have one when it's -20 degrees c outside! I usually edc a Maratac AAA in my pocket and carry a NC D10 along with a SF 6P w/ M60 in my courier bag so I quickly grabbed both and headed down the hall to talk to my managers.
The announcement came on and said that there was an alarm activated in the P2 parking garage and that we should all be in a hold state so we all waited. 5 minutes later, my manager came around telling everyone to evacuate, which was quickly followed by the announcement over the PA that all 20 floors were to evacuate the building.
I went to my station by the East stairwell and began directing people downstairs when one of my colleagues mentioned that the West stairwell was filled with smoke
and people coming down that stairwell could not see in front of them. I quickly directed one person to make sure they watch the East and I headed to the West stairwell. I felt the door knob - which was cool to the touch - and slowly opened the door to be met with grey... mist / fog. At first, I thought the fire dept must be hosing down a big fire in the garage and that the vapour was traveling up the stairwell but I quickly realized that the "smoke" didn't smell like smoke. It was like a giant steam room in the West stairwell! I felt that the emergency situation wasn't so bad afterall but I still didn't know the cause - the more pressing situation was that the stairwell was full of people trying to make it down to ground level in a stairwell with steam and they couldn't see 2 feet in front of them. I stood in the doorway with my NC D10 and shone it up the stairwell and told everyone there to exit the stairwell on my floor (5th) and cross over to the other clear stairwell. The D10 had a more narrow beam and less output than my SF 6P w/ M60 so I switched over to my SF 6P and directed it along the wall, up the stairs and yelled up to follow the light to the 5th floor to cross over. You can see some people were on the verge of panic as they couldn't see in front but I was able to tell them that they were almost at the landing and to take their time. They yelled back that they couldn't see a darn thing so I directly my beam up the stairs and told them to head for the light on the 5th floor landing.
I did this for 30 minutes and told one of my fellow wardens to periodically report back to me whether the other stairwell was clear - which it was. Once the final person was out (from what I could tell), I did a final sweep of the floor, exited the building and made my way to our company's rally point.
I finally got the update approx. 20 minutes later that the building had hired a company to complete some renovations in the P2 parking area and apparently some pipe was ruptured causing the steam to escape and up the stairwell. The most disappointing aspect of all of this is that the security personnel in the building, who did discover the steam traveling up about 8-10 stories of the West stairwell, didn't even bother to send anyone to ensure the occupants did not use that stairwell. They simply made an announcement over the PA - only problem is that there are no speakers in the stairwell!!! So, anyone who was already there didn't hear the message, including me.
From a Flashoholic standpoint, I was glad that I had my lights with me and that they were (somewhat) put to the test. My observations: LED lights, while not that great at penetrating steam / fog, did a decent job of projecting a beam of light out approx. 20-30 feet (I also shone it up centre of the stairwell between the railing to direct people), enough that people could see it. Also, both my lights were covered with moisture within 5-10 minutes but worked flawlessly. From the standpoint of the whole situation, I think we were very fortunate it wasn't a fire and no one panicked or was injured while traveling down that stairwell full of steam.
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