How to Create a Fire Escape Plan

One minute you are totally fine. It’s a Monday evening, the kids are outside playing and you’re about to start cooking dinner for the family. Your husband is relaxing and watching the evening news.

You cook every night for your family and you get enjoyment out of the process. Chopping, simmering, the smells are amazing. You are proud of your cooking skills and everyone seems to enjoy your cooking. You throw the veggies in the pan to caramelize the onions.

Three minutes later flames are raging up your cabinets. You know the fire is so intense you can’t just put it out on your own. You call 911, but where are the kids? Did they come back inside? Are they in the basement?

This is how majority of house fires happen. Yes, most fires start in the kitchen. Some sources say almost 60% of fires start in the kitchen. Do you have a plan to escape? Do your kids know what the plan is?

We’ll go over a few simples steps below to ensure you and your family have a solid plan of escape in case a fire ever starts in your home.

1. Get everyone in your family together to come up with the plan. You want to physically do a walk through your home to identify all of the exits. Look at the front and back door. If you’re in the basement check to see if you have an egress window. If you have children the best possible option is to draw out a plan like a map.

2. Identify all of the smoke alarms and make sure you have a smoke alarm in every room where someone sleeps. By code all of your alarms should be interconnected, which means that if one alarm goes off they will all go off.

3. After you escape there should be a plan as well. What happens when you get out? Come up with a meeting place that everyone will remember and recognize such as a stop sign, a neighbors house or something similar. Make sure the meeting place outside is not too close to your house. If there is an extreme fire in your home you will not be able to stand too close.

4. Don’t forget about grandpa! Seriously. If you have elderly people in the home, infants or people with disabilities then someone needs to be assigned to help them escape.

5. Regular guests? Many of us have certain friends or family members over often. If these particular people are over often enough then it’s important to keep them up to date on your plan. If you have people who spend the night then they should always be informed of your safety plan.

6. If your home has a second floor then every family member should be able to escape from the second floor using ladders. Please don’t allow children to practice using a ladder on a second floor.

7. Once you are out of the house please do not return. Under no circumstances should you return to a burning home or building.

Creating a plan does not have to be difficult or complicated. In fact we highly suggest you make the plan as simple as possible. Often times we are not able to think clearly and don’t have the best decision making skills when we are in a moment of emergency.

Create the plan so that a kindergarten student can easily understand. We also suggest sounding the smoke alarm to that everyone knows that when they hear that sound of the alarm then it means fire and that the escape plan should be started.