LGreene
REGISTERED
On Friday night, my friends and I went to a "show" (think men dressed as ladies) to celebrate my friend's 40th birthday. There were about 100 people in the nightclub, with an additional club in the basement. I did visually locate the emergency exit, but space was really tight so I didn't physically look at it until the show ended and we were heading toward the main entrance/exit. As we passed the emergency exit, I looked through the vestibule door lite and saw that the outside door had panic hardware, a deadbolt, AND a locked padlock. Once we got outside, I saw that the same door had a padlocked security gate outside of the exit door. This door was at the top of the stairs serving another nightclub in the basement, and also served the ground floor club where the show was taking place. There were no other visible exits besides the main entrance/exit at the other end of the room.
View attachment 1967
View attachment 1968
I always feel conflicted in this situation. I'm not out to "tattletale" but IMO this is a serious problem. I'm guessing the club knows that the exit is supposed to be unlocked, so I doubt they would change their policy just because I told them that it was a problem. So I contacted the fire department and they took it very seriously. This is the exact situation I was commenting about on another thread recently...if a facility is allowed to use something that's non code-complaint "after hours", there's a higher likelihood that it will be used when it shouldn't. So here's my question...why don't fire departments make it easier to report issues like this? In this case I sent an email to the main FD email address and they jumped on it. But in other cases involving different towns, there was no email address on the FD's website. Whenever I've reached an inspector, they have always been nice about it, but it would be easier for them to get info from feet on the street if there was an easy way to report something online. Do FDs want to hear about the issues, or is it more work for them to track down the complaints?View attachment 1967
View attachment 1968
/monthly_2013_10/572953ede2ff6_ExitDoorwithPadlocka.jpg.c301b963a26298d423ca92262324aaab.jpg
/monthly_2013_10/572953ede6189_LockedSecurityGatea.jpg.1ce9fae44472abb97eb48a91d7d21056.jpg
View attachment 1967
View attachment 1968
I always feel conflicted in this situation. I'm not out to "tattletale" but IMO this is a serious problem. I'm guessing the club knows that the exit is supposed to be unlocked, so I doubt they would change their policy just because I told them that it was a problem. So I contacted the fire department and they took it very seriously. This is the exact situation I was commenting about on another thread recently...if a facility is allowed to use something that's non code-complaint "after hours", there's a higher likelihood that it will be used when it shouldn't. So here's my question...why don't fire departments make it easier to report issues like this? In this case I sent an email to the main FD email address and they jumped on it. But in other cases involving different towns, there was no email address on the FD's website. Whenever I've reached an inspector, they have always been nice about it, but it would be easier for them to get info from feet on the street if there was an easy way to report something online. Do FDs want to hear about the issues, or is it more work for them to track down the complaints?View attachment 1967
View attachment 1968
/monthly_2013_10/572953ede2ff6_ExitDoorwithPadlocka.jpg.c301b963a26298d423ca92262324aaab.jpg
/monthly_2013_10/572953ede6189_LockedSecurityGatea.jpg.1ce9fae44472abb97eb48a91d7d21056.jpg
