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> people simply refusing to leave their home. This is the same in offices, in my experience. Our shared office building has a horrible fire system, and gets ab

by archon 10y ago

> people simply refusing to leave their home. This is the same in offices, in my experience. Our shared office building has a horrible fire system, and gets about a half dozen false fire alarms a year. My coworkers think I'm crazy for always going directly outside when the alarm starts blaring. Sooner or later, one of those "false alarms" is going to be real and people will still be sitting at their desks while the building is really on fire.

phkahler 10y ago
This reminded me of 9/11. I thought I heard that people in the second tower were being told by an official to stay at their desks. Why the heck would anyone advise people to remain with that huge and severely damaged building burning so close by? Just looking out the windows would have made me want to get far away from there. Did they really advise people to stay or is my memory faulty?
- Atheros 10y ago
  After the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, it turned out, in hindsight, that the best course of action was for people to say where they were. That memory and lesson was not lost by 2001. "Altogether, six people were killed and 1,042 others injured, most during the evacuation that followed the blast." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombin...
grahamburger 10y ago
I had this happen a few years ago. First day in a newly renovated part of the office. We had been told that there might be testing going on on the alarm system and that it might go off. Alarm starts going off and no one pays much attention until the smoke starts pouring through the hallways. A few offices didn't have a good view of the smoke and at least one of my co-workers stayed in the building for a good 15-20 minutes after everyone else left. No one injured, fortunately!
rwmj 10y ago
> Sooner or later, one of those "false alarms" is going to be real and people will still be sitting at their desks while the building is really on fire. Most people will never in their whole lives experience a real building fire. It would be much better to make false alarms extremely rare. Perhaps we could do a Toyota-style "five whys" for every single false alarm until the fire alarm in your office is fixed properly.

by archon 10y ago

phkahler 10y ago

This reminded me of 9/11. I thought I heard that people in the second tower were being told by an official to stay at their desks. Why the heck would anyone advise people to remain with that huge and severely damaged building burning so close by? Just looking out the windows would have made me want to get far away from there. Did they really advise people to stay or is my memory faulty?

Atheros 10y ago
After the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, it turned out, in hindsight, that the best course of action was for people to say where they were. That memory and lesson was not lost by 2001. "Altogether, six people were killed and 1,042 others injured, most during the evacuation that followed the blast." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombin...

grahamburger 10y ago

I had this happen a few years ago. First day in a newly renovated part of the office. We had been told that there might be testing going on on the alarm system and that it might go off. Alarm starts going off and no one pays much attention until the smoke starts pouring through the hallways. A few offices didn't have a good view of the smoke and at least one of my co-workers stayed in the building for a good 15-20 minutes after everyone else left. No one injured, fortunately!

rwmj 10y ago

> Sooner or later, one of those "false alarms" is going to be real and people will still be sitting at their desks while the building is really on fire. Most people will never in their whole lives experience a real building fire. It would be much better to make false alarms extremely rare. Perhaps we could do a Toyota-style "five whys" for every single false alarm until the fire alarm in your office is fixed properly.