Protect life and business with emergency planning

Insert graphic here:
width: 175px
height: 64px

Protect life and business
with emergency planning

Do your employees know what to do?

By Debra Susca

Freelance writer in Portland

No matter the size of your company, you need a well-thought-out plan that instructs employees what to do in case of an emergency. For companies with 10 or more people, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires that you have a written plan and documented training, or face possible citations and fines.

So explains Mark Haskins, principal of Practical Safety Solutions LLC, a safety consulting firm in Old Lyme. If you have fewer than 10 employees, your plan can be verbal, says Haskins, who advises firms on safety issues and emergency planning. “But you must have an emergency plan. Whether OSHA requires it or not, you want to protect yourself, your employees and your business. Loss is loss. A plan is about loss prevention and loss reduction.”

Basic steps for any company

Haskins recommends including the following in your emergency plan, even though they’re not required by law:

Contact lists for all employees and management personnel; OSHA, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection, and local departments of public works and health; local fire departments and ambulance services; hospitals, doctors and clinics; and electrical, plumbing and HVAC contractors.

Documentation of your facility, including a floor plan that clearly marks the locations of exits, fire extinguishers, medical kits, eye washes and any hazardous materials. (Note: Businesses with 10 or more employees must post a floor plan that identifies all exits.)

Al Niederfringer, vice president for risk control at Travelers, recommends checking with your local fire marshal to make sure your facility is in compliance with mandated fire and building codes. The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) safety code, which is administered locally, outlines building and fire safety requirements as well as how to help people with disabilities during an emergency. Niederfringer also advises having equipment such as alarms and sprinklers tested regularly (by you or your landlord) and conducting drills on a regular basis.

“It’s one thing to have the equipment installed and the building configured, but you need to make sure that it all works and that the behavior of employees is correct,” says Niederfringer. “Once you have a plan, you need to test it.”

Ralph Miller, fire and safety supervisor for the Office of the State Fire Marshall, also stresses the importance of safety drills. In addition, he recommends coordinating your emergency plan with the local fire and police departments. “If we’ve been given a plan, we know how many [people] are in the building, the set-up and contact people,” he says.

Miller also says your plan should include strategies for dealing with major weather events and violent situations in the workplace. “In today’s world, it’s important to have an emergency plan that’s coordinated with local officials.”

If you employ 10 or more

Under OSHA regulations, firms with 10 or more workers must have a written emergency action plan with sections on the following:

Evacuation. Outline how you will get people out of the building safely in case of fire or other emergencies and how you will account for their whereabouts. For a small firm, that might mean everyone meets in a designated area and the boss does a head count. In larger companies, it might entail designating one or more people to check on their way out that everyone is out of the building. In devising evacuation plans, you must also take into account anyone with a disability who might need special help — for instance, someone with a mobility problem who would have trouble negotiating stairs.

Medical response. You should have a system that assures that if someone becomes sick or injured at work, you will know how you’re going to handle it and who will be responsible. Some employers have certain employees trained in first aid or CPR, while others depend on outside help from fire and medical professionals. If a person’s condition is life threatening, OSHA requires your company to respond within four to six minutes; if it’s not life threatening, response time can be 12 to 15 minutes. For facilities where people work on exposed, energized electrical parts, OSHA requires having someone on site who has had emergency medical and CPR training.

Fire prevention. You should have fire extinguishers on site. You can decide whether to train all employees on how to use them to fight small, early-stage fires; train only certain employees to use them; or evacuate all employees and call in the fire department. (Under OSHA regulations, firms that have welding operations on the premises must have someone trained to use the extinguisher.) Also, you must do an assessment to identify the location and size of any major fire hazards, for instance, a propane tank in the facility, laboratories with flammable liquids, even a spray-painting operation.

Hazardous material releases. Companies with hazardous waste operations must have a plan and do training on how they will respond in case of a chemical release.

Confined spaces. OSHA also requires that you have a permit and emergency plan to cover employees entering confined spaces such as tanks, manholes, pits and boilers.

For more information on emergency planning: