Fire Response

Heat and toxic smoke from fire build up with surprising speed, quickly blocking escape paths. Few people are burned to death in fires; most die from smoke inhalation. Taking fire alarms seriously and exiting buildings quickly are essential to your survival.

There is no such thing as a fireproof building. Buildings made of stone or concrete present a risk when their contents burn.

For information on fires in science laboratories, please refer to the Bryn Mawr College Laboratory Emergency Guide, available in the science departments.

If a Fire Starts In Your Room, Office, or Elsewhere

  • Leave the room and close the door behind you to keep smoke and flames out of the hall. 
  • Sound the fire alarm by activating the nearest pull station, and leave the building by the closest exit. (Note: In residence halls, pull the alarm to alert others even if there is an individual smoke detector in the room, as the closed door will delay activation of the central alarm.) 
  • Call Campus Safety from a safe location.

If You See/Hear Fire Alarm

  • Immediately stop what you are doing, turn off any cooking or other hazardous equipment, and leave the building through the nearest exit.
  • Close room doors behind you.
  • Remember that in nearly every commercial building, there are at least two pathways to an exit, should your regular path be blocked.

  • Do not use the elevator. You could be trapped or let out into a fire area. 

Safety TipThe rule children are taught about crawling under smoke really works. If smoke blocks your path, there is often cleaner, cooler air nearer the floor level. Don't stand. Smoke and deadly gases rise.

If Your Room Door is Hot, or You Are Forced Back to Your Room By Smoke

This is the choice of last resort. Make every effort to leave the building as soon as you hear/see an alarm or other evidence of fire.

  • Let someone know you are in the room. If the phone works, call Campus Safety. 
  • If your window can be opened, hang a bedsheet or similar item out the window to signal the fire department, but close the window against smoke if necessary. 
  • Seal openings around hallway doors with cloth items (towels or sheets if available). If there is a source of water, keep towels and door wet.

Get the Fire Department On Scene Fast

Smoke detectors and pull stations are subject to false alarms such as overcooked popcorn in a microwave oven or a deliberate pull station activation. Unless Campus Safety has some evidence that a fire actually exists, they must dispatch an officer to the building to determine whether an alarm represents an emergency before calling the fire department.

Although Campus Safety will respond to any alarm as quickly as possible, to speed the arrival of fire trucks, call Campus Safety (from a safe location) and tell them you see fire or smoke. They will immediately summon the fire department and direct them to the location.

Safety Tip: When a fire occurs in a large building, valuable response time can be lost because everyone evacuating may assume that someone else called in the fire. Upon exiting a building in a fire emergency, call Campus Safety unless you know that the call was already made.

Should I Try to Put Out the Fire?

Fight a fire only if it is small and you believe you can put it out without risking your safety.

If the fire is small and:

  • an extinguisher is readily available, 
  • you are familiar with its operation, 
  • you can fight the fire without blocking your exit path 
  • the extinguisher is compatible with what's burning (e.g., flammable liquids or live electric equipment, see below)

Then attempt to extinguish the fire.

Generally, extinguishers are placed so that you must leave the immediate fire area, then decide whether it is safe to go back to fight the fire.

As a rule of thumb, an unconfined, small fire will render a typically furnished room intolerable to enter in about 30 seconds. Do not re-enter a room that is smoke-filled.

Safety Tip: The first priority in responding to a fire is preservation of life. No one is obliged to fight a fire.

Fire Extinguisher Operation

  • Remove the fire extinguisher from its supporting bracket or cabinet carefully; extinguishers are surprisingly heavy. The lower handle on the valve will support the extinguisher when carried. 
  • Remove the pin from the handle by pulling the ring, breaking the plastic tamper-evident seal. 
  • Aim the nozzle at the base of the flames, squeeze the handles together, and sweep the nozzle slowly from side to side, across the width of the flames until the fire is extinguished or the extinguisher is empty. You may repeatedly start and stop the flow of the extinguisher by squeezing and releasing the top handle. 
  • Start well back from the fire, walking into the "throw range" of the extinguisher. (See below). 
  • If a fire is not successfully controlled with one extinguisher, you should leave immediately.

Call Campus Safety, even if you successfully extinguish the fire.

Once the pin has been removed from a fire extinguisher, the extinguisher must be replaced, even if the extinguisher wasn't used. Call Campus Safety for immediate replacement.

Compatibility of Extinguishers and Fires

Multipurpose dry chemical extinguishers (usually red) are safe and effective against all ordinary types of fires). The extinguishing agent, a fine powder, will travel about 10 feet when discharged

Pressurized water extinguishers (shiny stainless steel,) are effective only against ordinary combustibles, such as paper, wood, fabric, trash, etc. They must never be used on flammable liquid/oil fires or fires involving live electrical circuits. Pressurized water units will propel a water stream about 25 to 30 feet.

Carbon dioxide extinguishers (red, cone-shaped black nozzle, no pressure gauge) work only against flammable liquid fires and are safe to use around live electrical circuits. They will not extinguish fires involving ordinary combustibles and must be discharged within about 3 feet of flames to be effective. They are rarely found outside of laboratory buildings.

Safety Tip: Learn the location and types of extinguishers in your building.

Helping a Person With Clothing or Hair On Fire

"Stop, Drop and Roll":

  • You must immediately get the person flat on the ground. Do not allow the person to run. 
  • Extinguish the flames by rolling the person on the ground. A jacket or blanket may be used to help smother the flames if immediately available. 
  • Seconds count. Do not waste time looking for an extinguisher or water source.
  • Douse the person with water as soon thereafter as possible. Do not attempt to remove burned clothing. 
  • Call Campus Safety. 

Fire Alarms and How They Work

Fire evacuation alarms may be activated by smoke detectors, heat detectors, manual pull stations or the flow of water through sprinkler heads. No matter what triggers the alarm, the fire bells, horns and/or flashing strobes will look and sound the same within a particular building.

Smoke/heat detectors. Detectors respond quickly to low levels of combustion products and/or rapid temperature increases, and offer critical evacuation time if you respond quickly to their alarms. In general, detectors in campus buildings sound the entire building's evacuation alarms and alert Campus Safety via a central alarm system wired to each building.

Special case — residence halls. Smoke detectors inside individual sleeping rooms operate independently of the central building system. The central system has detectors in hallways and common areas. When any of these detectors is activated, the evacuation alarms sound throughout the building and Campus Safety is alerted. The smoke detectors in individual rooms sound only at the detector, to notify a sleeping occupant of fire smoke within that room. They do not alert Campus Safety. If a fire should occur within your room, it is essential to manually activate a pull station to warn others as quickly as possible.

Sprinklered Buildings. Sprinkler heads are activated by heat (about 170° F), and only the heated sprinkler heads open. Sprinklers are very effective in containing fires, but they do not prevent the spread of dangerous smoke, so rapid evacuation of sprinklered buildings remains essential. The flow of water through a sprinkler system will activate building evacuation alarms and alert Campus Safety.

The following buildings are fully sprinklered:

  • Batten House
  • Benham Gateway
  • Bettws-y-Coed
  • Brecon
  • Cambrian Row
  • Campus Center
  • Carpenter Library
  • Child Study Institute (Little West House) 
  • Dalton 
  • Denbigh 
  • Enid Cook ’31 Center
  • Guild
  • Human Resources
  • Merion
  • New Dorm 
  • Park Science Complex
  • Pembroke East, West and Arch
  • Radnor
  • Rhoads
  • Rockefeller
  • Old Library
  • Schwartz Gym
  • Ward

Pull Stations: Manual pull stations in buildings activate the building evacuation alarms and alert Campus Safety when activated. Pull stations should be tripped if a fire is observed or strongly suspected. Take a moment to identify and learn how to operate the pull stations in your building.

Fire Safety Precautions

  • Self-closing doors need to close. Do not block open doors to stairwells or doors that divide long hallways. Closed fire doors significantly slow the spread of smoke. 
  • Self-closing doors equipped with magnetic door holders may be left open. The magnets will release, allowing the doors to close, when the fire evacuation alarm is activated. Do not let objects block the swing path of doors with magnetic catches. 
  • Don't overload outlets with multiple outlet cords or plugs. If additional outlets are required, use a UL-approved multi-outlet "power strip" with its own built-in circuit breaker. 
  • Careless smoking, use of candles, and unattended cooking appliances remain major causes of fatal fires in residential buildings. Smoking and the use of candles, incense, or open flames of any kind are prohibited in all College buildings.
  • Keep walkways, stairwells and exits free from obstructions at all times. 
  • Report non-illuminated exit signs, damaged fire equipment and other fire hazards to Campus Safety.
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Contact Us

Campus Safety Department

John Maloney Memorial Building
Phone: (610) 526-7911

Lil Burroughs
Bi-Co Executive Director, Campus Safety
Phone: (610) 526-7911