Conduct a fire safety inspection and a critical follow-up

What is going on

Two inspections fall to you this week. The first is a scheduled inspection of an aged care facility at Grovedale, triggered after crews responding to an automatic fire alarm on 9 September observed a slow evacuation. The second is a follow-up at a backpacker hostel in Torquay where a rear exit was found chained on 3 September and a critical notice was issued. Aged care residents and hostel guests are among the most vulnerable people in a fire. The Community Safety and Fire Prevention Policy requires every non-compliance to be graded and critical matters to be acted on before you leave the site, and the manager has asked to be called from the hostel if the exit is still chained.

Your brief

Plan and conduct both inspections lawfully and thoroughly using the inspection form, grade every non-compliance, act on critical matters on site, make referrals where required, enter both inspections in the register on the day and brief the manager on the outcomes.

Work through it

You do not need to do it all. Doing a few of these will show you what the work is like. Your ticks and notes stay on this device.

• Read the Community Safety and Fire Prevention Policy and the Fire Safety Inspection Report Form, and list the systems to inspect and the grading definitions for critical, major and minor non-compliances.
• Review the register entries for both premises and the Incident and Dispatch Log entry for the Grovedale alarm, and prepare an inspection plan for each with the specific concerns to check.
• At the aged care facility, identify yourself and the purpose, and inspect exits, fire doors, emergency lighting, detection and alarm, sprinklers, evacuation diagrams and the evacuation procedure and staff training records with the facility manager.
• Discuss the slow evacuation with the facility manager, identify the causes, and record findings and required actions with dates on the inspection form.
• At the hostel, inspect the rear exit and every other item from the original notice, and if the exit is still chained, act on site under the policy and call the manager as instructed.
• Grade every non-compliance at both premises, photograph each one, decide whether a referral to the building surveyor or another regulator is required and record it.
• Enter both inspections in the Inspections, Permits and Programs Register with the grade, status, notice details and follow-up dates on the day.
• Write a short briefing to the Manager Community Safety on both outcomes and whether either premises warrants a community education activity using the Community Awareness Program Plan Template.

What someone in this role would produce

• Two completed Fire Safety Inspection Report Forms
• Two register entries with grades, notices and follow-up dates
• Photographic evidence list for each non-compliance
• A briefing note to the Manager Community Safety