S 1.50 Smoke protection

Initiation responsibility: Management

Implementation responsibility: Architect

During fires, smoke poses the biggest danger to humans. More than 90 % of deaths in fires are the result of inhalation of fumes (poisoning). But IT hardware can also sustain serious damage through smoke. It is therefore important to provide full smoke protection.

The following recommendations regarding smoke protection should be considered:

• Fire protection doors should provide protection against smoke.

• Smoke protection doors in corridors should be controlled by smoke detectors. Such doors can always be left open as they close automatically when smoke is detected.

• The ventilation system and/or air conditioning should permit extraction of smoke in IT rooms.

• Sensors should be installed in the inlet and outlet ducts for the air conditioning system.

• Sensors should be installed in the fresh air supply which should automatically be blocked when an anomaly (smoke) is detected.

Staff must be told which warning signals have smoke protection components and how they should respond to activation of such an alarm.

All the smoke protection components must be checked regularly to ensure they are working properly.

Additional controls:

• When were the smoke protection components last checked to ensure that they are working properly?