CT Fire Safety

When do I need a fire sprinkler inspection?

Wed, 24 Jul 2019 16:26:31 GMT

How often?

Fire sprinkler inspections aren't the only thing on your agenda, but they may pop up quite frequently depending on your business. Inspections range from monthly to every five years. They can also land anywhere in between.

What if there's a fire?

At the point of a sprinkler activation, you don't immediately need an inspection. If a sprinkler head is activated due to a fire, you must replace every head in the affected area. For example, if a single sprinkler head is set off because of a paper burning in a trashcan, well that's an expensive situation because now every head in that room must be replaced.

And then?

After a technician comes out to replace the affected sprinkler heads, they then must perform specific tests. Make sure to hold on to your Inspection and Testing Report (ITR) that you'll receive after the test, because a fire inspector may ask for the records upon their annual visit.

The annual authority

The majority of insurance companies require you to have annual fire sprinkler inspections, that's where individual fire protection companies come out. The real authority lies in the hands of the Fire Marshal and their fire inspectors. These inspectors typically come out annually to inspect your fire suppression system. They hold the authority to tell business owners that they must get it repaired and tested. They generally give you one month to fix and test the equipment or they'll lock your doors.

What is a backflow?

Thu, 11 Jul 2019 12:52:42 GMT

Pipes, pipes, and more pipes

We all know that it takes lots of pressure to get water flowing through city pipes. That water sitting in the reservoir has to make it's way some 50 miles before it reaches your kitchen sink. Turn on the water to fill up a glass, and the pressurized water makes its way from the main source, up through a vertical pipe, and down through the faucet.

When you turn off the water, that pressure is still flowing down the main pipe to your neighbors. The pressurized water inside the vertical pipe will then flow back into the main pipe, and on to the next house. If there is water high enough up to reach the faucet when the flow stops, that water will be sucked back up the faucet and down to the main source.

This sink has a backflow prevention system, it just isn't very noticeable unless you know what you're looking for. Each sink has a line where the water buildup either drains or overflows; the purpose of this is so that the water inside the sink can't reach the faucet.

Backflow is the unwanted reversal of the flow of non-potable water into the piping of a public water system. A backflow preventer is a system that keeps the water from flowing back into the clean supply.

If the water were able to reach the faucet, there would be a chance of contaminating the main pipe that runs to the rest of your neighbors. This happens when there is a loss of pressure in the pipe leading up to the sink. If you put a bucket in your kitchen sink, and the water reaches the faucet, when it is shut off the water from the bucket will then be sucked back into the pipe it came from.

That water will run out of the house and back down to the main supply which continues pumping water to the rest of the street. This isn't the only instance where back-flow may occur; it is a serious risk to a city's water supply and that's why only technicians with a plumbing license may serve them.

Back-flows keep chemicals out of your water

Ever think gardening might be a risk to the population? Before irrigation laws, they probably didn't either. It takes good soil to grow healthy plants, and good soil requires nitrogen. Nitrates and nitrites are the two forms of nitrogen generally found in fertilizer. They are both harmful to the water supply, and that's why irrigation systems are required to have a back-flow preventer.

Back-flow preventers are most often found in the commercial sector, with businesses like restaurants, hotels, and factories. Each poses a risk to the local water supply because of their potential contaminants; bleach, bacteria, and oil are all prime examples.

States typically have laws on the prevention of cross-contamination. To make sure that the water supply remains safe, local fire departments require that businesses have their backflow preventer tested annually.

Save money choosing the right contractor

Wed, 03 Jul 2019 16:52:30 GMT

Fire

There are a variety of factors that a business must prepare for to protect its property. According to the NFPA, each year more than 3,000 commercial properties are set ablaze. The majority of these fires take place in business offices and generally speaking most of those could have been prevented.

You wouldn't think that one broken fire sprinkler could be the sole reason a property burns down, but a working one would be the reason a fire is put out in time.

An old beaten down power cable, a distracted employee, or a flickering light. None immediately seem like they would be a hazard, but that's where it leads. It's just a small flame at first, but it spreads. In a room with functional fire safety, the flame is put out in seconds and not too much damage is done.

In a room where the sprinkler head is malfunctioning, within 30 seconds that small flame has grown into a disaster. Everything ablaze this loss will cost the company a fortune in repairs.

That small risk of a fire is why local and national fire agencies require that all fire safety equipment be functional and up to date with the fire safety code. If they find a problem when they come out for the yearly inspection, they will give you a month to fix the problem or shut you out of business.

Water

Not only is water a big threat to your business, but your business is also a threat to the water which we all live off of. There are a lot of pipes under and around your building, and it isn't common knowledge to understand the purpose of each one.

The important thing to know is that there is the clean water that flows into your building, and there is the non-potable water that flows out. In the field of fire protection, they call that a back-flow; it keeps the dirty water from flowing back into the city. This equipment has to be serviced by someone who holds a plumbing license because it could contaminate the city's water supply if serviced incorrectly.

CT fire protection, Inc. holds a plumbing license so that when called out to jobs that need to be brought up to code, we can maintain the back-flow. It saves you the time and money of calling a plumber after you had someone come out to inspect your fire safety equipment.

Theft

In the grand scheme of things, a local business owner stands against a great deal of risk. One of the worst situations to come your way is finding that someone has stolen from your office. There are a lot of ways to prevent theft, and one of the best is through CCTV.

Closed-circuit television, more commonly known to the public as security cameras, is one of the most secure forms of protection against theft. If you have a camera facing towards the entrance to your building, that means that any break-in which occurs while you're away is caught on camera.

There are also motion detectors that tell you when someone has entered a restricted area, access panels which notify you when a door was opened, and water detectors which tell you when there is water leaking into your building. All of these devices work together to keep you aware of what is going on at the office, so that everything inside, stays inside.

Not only do we specialize in fire protection, but we also provide businesses with security systems and monitoring. That means that you only have to go through one contractor to protect your business from fire, water, and theft. We are one responsibility in exchange for multiple services.

You can stop stressing about whether or not your investment is safe at the office when you go through CT Fire Protection, Inc. for your fire safety inspection and services.

The wrong way to do fire protection

Mon, 01 Jul 2019 14:12:54 GMT

You're sitting at the office on a Monday morning and out of nowhere, an alarm goes off. A little hesitant, you get on your phone and call 9-1-1, "an alarm is going off but there's no fire, what do I do?"

They send out a team, and you start to calm down once the professionals are at work. A few hours go by, and they find out the problem has nothing to do with your fire alarm, it was just a sprinkler malfunction. Nothing too important though, right?

Wrong. Any sprinkler that isn't working properly is a hazard to the whole building, and according to national fire laws, those have to be functional.

You go back inside and realize, "Wait, the alarm is still going off." It turns out that the guys who came out didn't fix the problem. What you didn't know is that the fire department doesn't repair the fire prevention equipment in that office you just started leasing, you've got to find someone else for that.

The fire department will send out someone to inspect your equipment and ensure that it is all up to code, but when that's all said and done, you have to find another party to come out and do repairs if something isn't working.

So, that alarm has been going off all day, and after hours of searching, you found someone who repairs fire protection equipment. They come out and assess the damage, which is a second bill, "but I already know what the problem is, it's the sprinklers!" Unfortunately, it's not that simple. A service tech still has to come out and determine the problem with the sprinkler, before they can fix anything.

It's the next day, and you still have that alarm going off saying your equipment isn't working. Another technician comes out, and after a few hours of work he has the sprinkler system all patched up. "Great, now we can put this in the past," you think to yourself. Then the technician gives you the news, "you're going to need someone else to come out and inspect my work because I'm not a certified inspector."

Wednesday morning, you get a piece of mail from the local Fire Department. It's a bill for a fire alarm inspection. "But wait, they didn't even do anything," it comes as a surprise. Though they still came in response to your call, so you still have accountability for the cost.

Three days later, you've got a bill from the fire department, a repairman, and a fire safety inspector. Three different people you had to go back and forth making calls and sending emails. Three separate bills for time wasted on repeated inspections.

The easier solution is to go through a fire protection company, such as CT Fire Protection, Inc. It's not something the average business owner thinks about daily; you've got to keep your safety equipment up to code, and the people who tell you it isn't are completely separate from those who can fix it.

We employ certified inspectors so that when a new or current property has something wrong with there equipment, our technicians can determine what that is. The same people can order the parts and repair the system.

Since it's all done under one roof, the person who comes out to inspect it, and repair it, is the same person who can determine that it is safe and up to code with local fire laws. That means less responsibility for your business and less stress for you as a business owner.

Going through CT Fire Protection, Inc. to monitor your fire safety equipment is the simple, cost-effective way to go.