Virtually every day, stories about vandalism in schools appear in the press, all with one consistent theme.  The vandals and criminals discharge fire extinguishers in the facilities causing substantial damage, evacuations, school closings and costly cleanup charges.  Here are some stories about schools that have been subjected to fire extinguisher vandalism in just the past few weeks.

Fire Extinguisher Vandalism Rates Increase at St. Boneventure University

According to a recent article in the school newspaper, The Bona Venture, Fire Extinguisher vandalism and misuse rates have increased dramatically campus wide in the last several weeks.  Misuse of this vital fire safety equipment has resulted in mass student evacuation from buildings and residence halls and costly cleanup projects. As Ralph Aloia, the deputy director of safety and security for the university points out:

"The cost of a fire extinguisher itself is around $70; however, the cost to the community could be their safety, welfare and health," Aloia said. "When extinguishers are taken from their intended area and discharged, the potential cost of personal-property damage and life safety from fires to others is a huge issue."

"It is only a matter of time when a fire happens again," he said. "The history of the university speaks volumes about fires here. The community needs to come together about disregarding each others' safety. How would one actually feel if they knew their actions led to someone getting severely hurt?"

We couldn't agree with Mr. Aloia more.  Fire extinguishers extinguished approximately 5.32 million fires in the US last year, and ensuring that these vital pieces of life safety equipment are where they are supposed to be, available, accessible and functioning properly is what en-Gauge was founded to accomplish.

Vermont School Vandalized for the Third Time This Year

A tiny Vermont school district has been burglarized and vandalized three times so far this academic year.  As Vermont TV station WPTZ.com reports:

Vermont State Police are investigating a burglary at the Twinfield Union School early this morning, the third break-in in the tiny district this academic year.

Superintendent Nancy Thomas said a damage estimate was not yet available but she said there was broken glass, fire extinguisher residue all over and office equipment was stolen.

The 440-student K through 12 school was closed Monday for cleanup but will reopen on Tuesday.

As a community, when a school is forced to close for a day due to fire extinguisher vandalism, what is the economic impact?  How many parents need to take a day off from work?  How much lost productivity does this result in?  The cost is a lot higher than a custodian's time to thoroughly clean a building.

Vandals Trash Special Needs School, Discharge Extinguishers

In a sad story, vandals in California broke into a special needs school and caused significant damage to the Richard Henry Dana Exceptional Needs Facility and the elementary school next door.  In each instance, there was significant damage to the facility and the locations were coated with residue from discharged extinguishers.  Watch this segment from KABC in Los Angeles to see the damage.

As you can see in the video, the police investigators don't hold out much hope that the criminals will be caught.  Another benefit of electronically monitoring fire extinguishers is that alarms can be triggered when an extinguisher is pulled, resulting in a rapid response to situations like this.

Oklahoma City School Vandalized, Thousands in Damages

According to KFOR, Channel 4 in Oklahoma City:

A metro elementary school was targeted by vandals over the weekend. Officials say the vandals caused thousands of dollars in damage and it's not the first time this school has been hit recently.

Principal Phillip Cunningham said, "Everything was on the floor, fire extinguishers discharged, a lot of equipment broken and damaged."

These types of stories are all too common.  With budgets tight and school boards struggling to stretch every dollar, losing days to cleanup or fire damage is unacceptable.  To learn more about how to ensure your school is protected with electronically monitored fire extinguishers, contact en-Gauge today.

According to the most recent NFPA (National Fire Protection Association) data, in 2010 U.S. fire departments responded to an estimated 1,331,500 fires. These fires resulted in 3,120 civilian fire fatalities, 17,720 civilian fire injuries and an estimated $15,478,000,000 in direct property loss.

Of these fires 98,000 were responded to in commercial or municipal buildings. Of the over $11.6 billion in property damage, more than $2.6 billion took place in these non-residential structures. This represents an average loss per reported incident in non-residential / commercial structures of over $34,000.

This only tells a portion of the fire story, however.

Fire Extinguishers Effectively Put Out 80% of All Fires

To highlight the effectiveness of extinguishers in the early stage fire fighting, a 2002 UK study performed by FETA (Fire Extinguishing Trades Association) and IFEDA (Independent Fire Engineering and Distributors Association)5 reviewed over 2100 fire incidents and found that in 80% of the cases a portable fire extinguisher successfully extinguished the fire and in 75% of those cases, the fire department was not required to attend.

A similar survey was conducted in 2002 by EUROFEU (European Committee of the Manufacturers of Fire Protection Equipment and Fire Fighting Vehicles)in 6 European countries and it found strikingly consistent results. In over 2600 incidents recorded it concluded that in 81.5% of cases the portable extinguisher successfully extinguished the fire and in 74.6% of the cases the fire department was not required to attend.
 
Extrapolating the results of these surveys to the U.S. market provides solid statistical evidence that in approximately 80% of all fire incidents a portable fire extinguisher is the only fire fighting tool needed to extinguish the fire. Further, they indicate that in 60% of all fire incidents the fire department is not notified (and thus the event would not appear in NFPA statistics).

Fire Extinguisher Success Rates (Estimated)

• Fires Handled entirely by extinguishers with Fire Department not being notified = 1,997,250
• Commercial Strucure fires handled entirely by exinguishers with Fire Department not being notified = 147,000
• Estimated savings in avoided property loss in commercial buildings = 147,000 X $34,000 equals $4.998 Billion
• Fires in which fire extinguishers were the only needed form of fire supression = 5,326,000
• Fires in commercial structures in which extinguishers were the only needed form of fire suppression = 392,000

Although these are only estimates, these numbers make clear that the positive impact of fire extinguishers on society is tremendous.  When fire extinguishers are not available to do their job because they are blocked, missing or depressurized, the results can be deadly, catastrophic and costly.  en-Gauge's electronic fire extinguisher monitoring solution makes sure these vital life safety devices are available, accessible and working properly.

To learn why electronically monitored fire extinguishers are also the most environmentally friendly form of fire protection, check out this White Paper going over all the details.

RTLS and Life Safety Monitoring:  Reducing Risk, Lowering Costs, Improving Patient Care

As Real time location systems become more widely deployed and used to track vital equipment, especially in healthcare facilities, manufacturing plants and the hospitality industry, businesses are starting to look to integrate critical life safety equipment in their RTLS deployments. Devices such as employee distress medallions, medical oxygen tanks, fire extinguishers, AED’s (Automated External Defibrillators), IV pumps and many others are being integrated into RTLS infrastructure providing businesses with tremendous ROI through improved process and reduced inventory, as well as substantially lowered risk and improved life safety.

RTLS systems are wireless networks deployed inside of facilities, that in conjunction with RFID tags and a software layer, provide businesses with insight into exactly where on their campus each piece of tracked equipment resides at any point in time. In addition, sensors play an important role in life safety monitoring as well.

Fire Extinguishers and RTLS

Does the fire extinguisher in the northern hallway, on the 4th floor of the Green building have pressure? Has it been removed, or are there obstructions in front of it that may make it difficult or impossible to access? These sensors provide information into the “state” of the equipment, while the RTLS solution provides insight into the “Location” of each device.

This insight leads to substantial opportunities for process improvement and improved life safety. Your facility team is notified the instant an extinguisher is removed, becomes depressurized or is blocked, leading to a reduction in vandalism, rapid response to emergencies (and insight into where the extinguishers are being used), and dramatically improved maintenance and replacement cycles ensuring that these critical devices are available, accessible and ready in an emergency.

Medical Oxygen and RTLS

As another example, consider medical oxygen tanks in a hospital. Today, most organizations have a highly decentralized and inefficient system for managing their oxygen inventory. Nurses and other care providers are responsible for identifying empty cylinders and replacing them. The disorganized process leads to bloated inventory levels, unnecessary refills and life threatening emergencies when finding a full cylinder is difficult.

With RTLS systems and smart gauges, central maintenance teams are notified the moment a cylinder begins to run low and the exact location of that cylinder. They are able to ensure that there is plenty of available oxygen at each location ensuring RN’s are no longer searching for and replacing cylinders in a rush. Understanding the state of the oxygen inventory results in substantial reductions in the necessary cylinder inventory on site. Early indications are that medical oxygen monitoring utilizing an RTLS system will provide a $500 per bed / per year savings over existing processes.

Each additional type of life safety device that is brought into an RTLS system has their own compelling value proposition. To learn more about how RTLS systems and life safety monitoring systems work, contact en-Gauge today to speak with one of our experts.

Medical oxygen is a vital component of quality healthcare in the United States and around the world with tens of thousands of people a day relying on it in emergencies and for quality-of-life. With such extensive usage and resultant inconsistent processes, managing medical oxygen is a substantial and costly challenge for every healthcare operator - from hospitals to assisted living facilities and hospice providers. Electronic monitoring and tracking of medical oxygen allows healthcare businesses to substantially improve their internal processes, enhance patient care, lower risk and reduce costs. But what is electronic medical oxygen monitoring?

What is Medical Oxygen Monitoring - Electronic Medical Oxygen Monitoring Defined.

To effectively remotely monitor a healthcare facility's medical oxygen inventory, two critical pieces of data must be tracked.

1. Pressure: Each medical oxygen canister is equipped with a pressure gauge to indicate whether the tank is running low. Generally it is up to RNs and other care providers to manually keep an eye on these gauges, determine when the canisters are at risk of running out, and scramble to find and replace these cannisters. With electronically monitored oxygen, the gauges are replaced by "smart gauges" that communicate wirelessly back to a centralized monitoring location that immediately notifies the appropriate personnel when a cannister is starting to run low on air pressure. This notification can take place in a variety of ways - smartphone, email, text message - and allows healthcare providers to lower risk and avoid potentially catastrophic mistakes.

2. Location: In addition to the pressure of a particular canister, it is important to know exactly where each canister is in the facility at any point in time. As oxygen cannisters are often mobile along with patients and equipment, having real-time location information allows healthcare operators to effectively respond to medical oxygen issues, including empty canisters, or locating a full canister in the event of an emergency. Integrating the medical oxygen inventory into a healthcare facility's existing RTLS (Real-Time Location Service) allows for rapid deployment of the location tracking of medical oxygen inventory.

Benefits of Electronic Medical Oxygen Monitoring

Tracking the location and pressure of your medical oxygen inventory results in a variety of benefits for a healthcare provider including improved patient care, lower costs, lowered insitutional risk, reduced inventory and re-allocation of work to the appropriate human resources. Some highlights include:

• Process Improvement - With instant notification anytime an oxygen canister is running low and the exact location of that canister, healthcare operators can eliminate the scramble associated with identifying an empty extinguisher and finding a replacement (generally agreed to take approximately 10 to 15 minutes per RN per shift). Additionally, maintenance personnel - as opposed to high priced RNs - can manage the replacement of the canisters before they become a concern, enhancing patient care.
• Inventory Right-sizing - Because of inefficiencies in process and the wide array of individuals interacting with the medical oxygen inventory, hospitals and healthcare facilities often rent and maintain substantially more medical oxygen inventory than they need. For many organizations electronic medical oxygen monitoring can result in a 30% or more reduction in canister inventory. Additionally, improved processes and electronic monitoring of pressure can result in a near elimination of unnecessary re-charges of full or mostly full canisters (a very common problem in healthcare).
• Lower costs - Elimination of unneccessary inventory and canister refills, the redistribution of responsibilities from RNs to lower cost maintenance personnel, process improvements and procurement improvements can add up to big savings. Some hospitals estimate the savings at $500 or more per year per bed.
• Improved Care - Most importantly, electronic medical oxygen monitoring leads to improved care by dramatically lowering the risk associated with unneccesary empty or missing medical oxygen tanks.

To learn more about Electronic Medical Oxygen Monitoring and how to implement this valuable, cost-saving solution in your healthcare operation, contact en-Gauge today.

At en-Gauge, we are always keeping our eyes open for Fire Extinguisher Success Stories,   We

 ran across this story earlier on FayObserver.com.....

A malfunctioning air conditioner was blamed for a fire in a second-floor office at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center on Ramsey Street (In Fayettville, AR) on Wednesday morning, authorities said.

The fire was reported about 11 a.m. in a file room and was put out with a fire extinguisher in about 5 minutes, said Nixon Spell, a battalion commander with the Fayetteville Fire Department.

Some people were briefly evacuated, Spell said, but no patients were affected.

The en-Gauge system is installed and monitoring fire extinguishers at a number of VA Medical Centers,  we're proud to be helping make our VAs safer.  Having extinguishers monitored 24 x 7 x 365 provides en-Gauge customers with the confidence to know that their extinguishers are where they are supposed to be, accessible and in working order when an emergency occurs.  For more information about how the en-Gauge electronic fire extinguisher monitoring system works, watch this short video.

en-Gauge is dedicated to improving life safety, and for years we have been discussing the dangers related to uninspected and empty, missing and blocked fire extinguishers.  Still, it never fails to distress us when we learn about a situation where uninspected fire extinguishers are a contributing factor to the loss of life.  

A recent report from KOB Eyewitness News in Albuquerque, NM highlights just the kind of danger that unispected extinguishers can pose to families.  In this situation, the extinguisher inspections were negelected in an apartment complex and the results were fatal for a little girl.  According to kob.com:

There are many Albuquerque apartment complexes with big problems. What landlords and tenants may not realize is that some problems could be a matter of life or death.

A fire ripped through one Albuquerque apartment, killing one-year-old Malia Mitchell last September. The girl's mother tried using two different fire extinguishers but said neither of them worked.

Watch the full report here to learn more.

We ran across this video recently depicting exactly why Automated External Defibrillators are so important to any Life Safety Effort.  There are several things about this video that are worth watching:

• How AED's work.  If you haven't seen an AED in action, this video will provide you with a real time overview of exactly how these critical devices work in an emergency
• The victim in this video was surrounded by trained lifeguards, and without the AED is is pretty apparent they would have been unlikely to save the victim's life
• Time is of the essence when it comes to AEDs.  They need to be close at hand and they need to be where they are supposed to be and fully charged.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper recently announced plans to federally fund Automated External Defibrillators and related training in hockey arenas and community recreation centers throughout Canada.  According to the Canadian Heart and Stroke Foundation in their announcement of the initiative:

Defibrillators are electronic devices used to restart a person's heart that has stopped beating. They are safe, easy to use, and can be operated effectively by the lay public.

Up to 85 per cent of all cardiac arrests occur in public settings or homes. Less than five per cent of victims who have a cardiac arrest outside of hospital survive. The early use of a defibrillator along with CPR before the arrival of emergency services can increase the individual's chance of survival by up to 75 per cent. This is critical, given that the survival rate decreases seven to 10 per cent with every passing minute.

At en-Gauge, we are big believers in the effectiveness and importance of AED's.  That is why we provide electronic monitoring of these critical life safety devices - to make sure they are where they are supposed to be and ready for action.  For more information on how en-Gauge can help you deploy and monitor your AED life safety program, contact us today.