The Disability Discrimination Act allows for disabled people to have equal access to any public building or facility where it is reasonable for adjustments to allow them access to be made. For individuals with a physical disability this means adjusting buildings with multiple floors to have access above the ground floor without stairs, usually by the addition of an elevator.
This does present a problem in the event of an emergency, as the lift will be unavailable but any physically disabled individual will still need to descend to the ground floor to evacuate the building. The solution to this is the evacuation chair, or evac chair as it is sometimes known.
It is a legal requirement for anyone who enters a building to be able to exit it in the event of an emergency, and for responding fire personnel not to have to enter the building – they may of course enter the building if they feel it is safe to do so, but this requirement precludes the use of shelter areas inside the building as a valid solution to the safety of physically disabled individuals in the event of a fire. Evacuation chairs are therefore a required addition to any building where access above the ground floor is possible for a physically disabled person, even where no physically disabled person is expected.
For example, a building with a lift where no physically disabled employees work. It is possible that a physically disabled client could be visiting an employee in that building, so the provision of an evacuation chair needs to be made for the building.
A basic model evac chair has the ability to secure an individual to the chair, and allow a single user to safely navigate stairs while the disabled individual is so secured, without the need for heavy lifting. More expensive models may have greater comfort features, such as arm and foot rests, telescopic or adjustable handles or ergonomic back support, and may be designed for more compact storage, but the basic model evac chair is sufficient to meet the legal requirements for evacuation chair provision.
Facilities with a large number of physically disabled individuals who may have other care requirements such as oxygen cylinders may invest in advanced evacuation chairs with the capability to also carry extra support equipment, but these evac chairs are often not suitable for single users and may require extra individuals to assist during the evacuation.
Sufficient individuals should be trained in the correct usage of the evacuation chair which is available in the building to ensure that it is possible to safely evacuation all individuals in need during an emergency without excessively endangering the safety of the other individuals in the building, both those assisting with the evacuation chair and others using the same staircase as their means of egress.
The evacuation chair is an important advancement in both building safety and the provision of disabled facilities, and while advancements to the basic design improve storage and comfort the utility of the basic design is hard to beat.
