With the steady development of China's national economy and the continuous improvement of people's living standards, life expectancy has also been extended. Meanwhile, with the long-term implementation of the national policy of family planning, the age structure of China's population has undergone changes. At present, the elderly population aged 60 and above in China has exceeded 1/10 of the total population, and some economically developed provinces and cities have approached 1/6 of the local population. The trend of aging development is obvious. In recent years, due to the updating of life philosophy and the continuous progress of social civilization, the ways of elderly care have become increasingly diversified. In addition to traditional home-based elderly care, social elderly care institutions such as elderly apartments, nursing homes, and daycare centers have also gradually been recognized and accepted, and the construction of elderly care institutions has shown a rapid development trend. While witnessing these developments and changes, we should also note that due to the dense population of elderly care institutions, inadequate basic facilities and management in some places, coupled with weak fire safety awareness and self-protection and self rescue abilities of the elderly, accidents such as group injuries and fires often occur. Siemens FS720 indicates that the fire safety of nursing homes is increasingly receiving attention from people.

1、 Characteristics of fire in elderly care institutions

In recent years, there have been some typical cases of fire in nursing homes both domestically and internationally. On March 20, 2007, at 1:11, a major fire broke out in a nursing home for the elderly in southern Russia, resulting in 63 deaths and 33 injuries; On the night of June 15, 2008, a fire broke out at No. 61 Garden Road, Jianshan District, Shuangyashan City. Six elderly people unfortunately died in the fire, and two were injured. One of the injured died in the early morning of the 24th; At 1:35 am on December 3, 2008, a fire broke out in the Kuanxin Elderly Apartment in Lucheng District, Wenzhou City, resulting in the unfortunate death of seven elderly people, the oldest of whom was 94 years old; On the evening of January 31, 2009, a fire broke out in a nursing home in the Komi Republic of northwestern Russia, resulting in 23 deaths and 2 missing.

Based on the analysis of the background information related to the four typical fires mentioned above, fires in elderly care institutions exhibit the following characteristics: they are prone to form fires with group deaths and injuries, such as the "Home of the Elderly" nursing home accommodating 93 elderly people. The Comfort Elderly Apartment accommodated 70 elderly people, resulting in 63 and 7 deaths respectively; The occurrence of fires is relatively concentrated in the winter and spring seasons, with three out of the four cases occurring during this period; Elderly people are prone to injury and death in fires, such as the average age of fatalities in apartment fires is 77 years old; The causes of fires are closely related to the living and physiological characteristics of the elderly. Most elderly people have difficulty moving, their ability to take care of themselves decreases, and their thinking reactions are relatively slow. They often cause fires due to careless use of fire, smoking in bed, and improper use of electric heating appliances. The above characteristics are consistent with the fire statistics in recent years.

2、 Analysis of fire hazards in elderly care institutions

1. The legal awareness of operators is indifferent. Some elderly care institutions have been renovated and operated at risk without undergoing fire safety review, acceptance, and inspection. For residential buildings of this type of elderly population, regulations and standards such as the "Design Code for Elderly Buildings", "Design Standards for Elderly Residential Buildings", and "Code for Fire Protection in Building Design" all require safety, hygiene, and applicability that meet the physical and mental characteristics of the elderly. Some operators, either due to a lack of legal awareness or for the purpose of avoiding supervision and reducing operating costs, knowingly operate without authorization. Some are converted from residential buildings, industrial factories, or warehouses, and are simplified according to basic needs. For example, the Xinxin Elderly Apartment is a brick and wood structure with a lower fire resistance rating; Some external environments are poor, located in remote areas, with insufficient fire separation, narrow roads, and a lack of water sources. After a fire occurs, the fire brigade cannot arrive in a timely manner and provide effective rescue; Some internal conditions are not matched, fire-fighting facilities are not in place, safety evacuation does not meet standards, leaving congenital safety hazards. For example, the Fushouxing Elderly Apartment operates without a license, and the Xinxin Elderly Apartment was revoked due to failing fire safety inspections. However, they have been taking risks in operating it, ultimately leading to tragedy.

2. The management of building usage is relatively weak. One is that the system is not sound, and various activities, including safety work, lack institutional constraints and behavioral norms. The second issue is that employees have poor safety awareness and fire safety skills. They have not conducted pre job safety education, nor have they formulated emergency and evacuation plans and conducted drills. They are unable to detect and eliminate safety hazards in a timely manner, and are at a loss during disasters, with no way to self rescue. The third is to consider one aspect while losing the other, resulting in imbalanced management. Some operators, for the sake of preventing elderly people from falling and preventing theft, often take measures such as installing iron fences on the exterior windows, retaining the main passage, and locking other exits, greatly reducing the evacuation capacity in the event of a fire. In the fire at the nursing home of the elderly in Russia, staff were unable to find the key to the emergency exit of the building in a timely manner, delaying subsequent evacuation work and causing numerous deaths and injuries among the elderly. The fourth issue is the insufficient number of nursing staff, especially at night, where there are often only one to two nursing staff, making it difficult to effectively carry out self rescue and personnel evacuation in the event of a fire. There are few male nursing and support personnel, and they cannot handle emergencies such as power outages, tripping, and fires calmly and decisively, which can easily lead to panic due to untimely handling, resulting in increased losses and casualties. The fifth is the unreasonable distribution of nursing areas. Many elderly care and daycare facilities, for various reasons, concentrate elderly people, those with limited mobility, and poor self-care abilities on higher floors for living. However, due to the lack of slopes connecting to the ground, it increases the difficulty of evacuating such people during fires. The author once discovered during a visit that out of the 5 elderly apartments inspected, 4 had similar issues.

3. There are many fire hazards. One is the presence of a large amount of combustible materials. Furniture, bedding, clothes, curtains, etc. are combustible materials. In order to maximize the business area and reduce costs, flammable and combustible materials are used for internal separation in other places. For example, foamed plastic materials are used for the partition walls of the Russian "Home for the Elderly" nursing home, which resulted in a large amount of toxic smoke in the fire. Many elderly lost consciousness soon after inhaling the smoke and died. The room where the Xinxin Elderly Apartment caught fire was about 60 square meters, divided into three parts by wooden boards, where two elderly men and five elderly women lived respectively. There was also a miscellaneous room, and all seven people died after the fire. The foam benzene plate is used to make beds for the elderly in Fushouxing Elderly Apartment in Shuangyashan City. The benzene plate is easy to burn and emits a lot of toxic smoke. Secondly, there is a high use of fire in daily life. Cooking a fire, using mosquito coils to repel mosquitoes, using candles for lighting, and smoking while lying in bed can easily lead to a fire. According to the investigation, the fire in the Comfort Elderly Apartment was caused by one of the victims, Shi, who was 79 years old and had a habit of smoking in bed. He used a lighter improperly in bed and ignited combustible materials. The third is the prominent hidden danger of electricity consumption. The phenomenon of unauthorized connection of electrical circuits, inferior electrical quality, overloading of electricity usage, prolonged use of electric blankets, use of electric heaters to bake clothes, and insufficient spacing is quite common.

4. The physical and psychological characteristics of the elderly are prone to fire hazards. Many elderly people have poor memory and a vague sense of safety. Therefore, fires caused by smoking in bed, leaving behind sparks, forgetting to turn off electric heating appliances, or excessive baking of electric heating appliances often occur. Additionally, due to limited mobility and weak self-care ability, they are unable to call for help and dispose of them in a timely manner, resulting in small fires leading to major disasters. For example, among the 18 elderly residents living in Fushouxing Elderly Apartment in Shuangyashan City, 16 have difficulty moving. In addition, some elderly people are reluctant to throw things and have a habit of piling up clutter, which also causes headaches for the management personnel of nursing homes. Many elderly people will tidy up books, cardboard, and other miscellaneous items and place them in their rooms, some of which may even pile up in the hallway. Once a fire breaks out, a large amount of debris is likely to block the escape route.

3、 Fire safety measures

Based on the above analysis, according to the current technical specifications and standards in China, improving the fire safety level of elderly care institutions can be approached from the following aspects:

1. Architectural requirements. Elderly care institutions such as senior apartments and nursing homes should be set up in independent buildings, and the structure should not be lower than level one or level two; When it is necessary to install it in other civil buildings, independent safety exits should be set up, and non combustible walls with a fire resistance limit of no less than 2.00 hours and floor slabs with a fire resistance limit of no less than 1.00 hours should be used to separate it from other places or parts. When the wall must open the door, Class B fire doors should be installed. Room partition walls and ceilings shall not use flammable or combustible materials, and partition walls shall be enclosed to the upper floor slab. There shall be no less than 2 safety exits in the premises. The number of floors should not exceed 3, and buildings with a third level fire resistance rating should not exceed 2 floors or be located on 3 or more floors or in underground or semi underground buildings (rooms). Buildings with a fourth level fire resistance rating are only allowed to be located on the first floor of the building.

The net width of public walkways should not be less than 1.50m, and internal walkways with a length greater than 20m should be equipped with smoke exhaust facilities. The effective width of public stairs should not be less than 1.20m, and enclosed stairwells should be used. The doors in stairwells should be Class B fire doors. The height of the window sill wall and the width of the window to window wall should not be less than 1.2 meters to reduce the spread of the fire. When conditions permit, the doors of elderly people's homes leading to public areas should be fireproof doors, and observation windows should be fireproof windows; Multi story buildings should be equipped with ramps, with a net width of no less than 1.50m and a slope of no more than 1/12. When the ramp turns, a rest platform should be installed, and the net depth of the rest platform should not be less than 1.50m.

2. Fire protection facility requirements. According to the Code for Fire Protection Design of Buildings, elderly buildings should be equipped with automatic fire alarm systems. But we also need to fully consider that most elderly people have diseases such as high blood pressure and heart disease. Whether it is a false alarm or a sharp alarm and strong flashing caused by a fire, the alarm system may cause widespread panic, resulting in accidental casualties among the elderly. Therefore, in the case of sufficient nursing staff, the sound and light alarm device of the fire automatic alarm system should be set up in the management room, and the management room should be manned for 24 hours; Sound and light alarm devices installed in public areas should replace the stimulating alarm sound with soft music; The alarm system should be connected to the remote fire monitoring center in the city. Outdoor fire hydrants and other fire water sources should be installed within a range of 150 meters outside the building, and indoor fire hydrants with fire hoses should be installed inside the building; Although there is no explicit requirement in the current "Code for Fire Protection Design of Buildings" for the installation of automatic sprinkler fire extinguishing systems in such places, based on the characteristics of fires in such places and the analysis of hidden dangers mentioned above, in order to improve the efficiency of fire control and extinguishing, and reduce casualties, automatic sprinkler fire extinguishing systems or local application systems can be installed inside the building according to the size of the building model and the basic situation of the reception object. The fire hazard level of the building shall refer to the medium hazard level. In fact, when an automatic sprinkler fire extinguishing system is installed and measures can be taken to ensure that it is always in good and effective condition, an automatic fire alarm system may not be installed in the premises. Fire extinguishers in buildings are classified as Class A locations. Those with more than 50 elderly beds are classified as severely hazardous, with a fire extinguisher configuration level of 3A and a maximum protection area of 50m2/A per unit level. Those with less than 50 elderly beds are classified as medium hazardous, with a fire extinguisher configuration level of 2A and a maximum protection area of 75m2/A per unit level. A leakage fire alarm system should be installed in the premises. Fire emergency lighting and light evacuation signs should be installed at evacuation routes and safety exits. Considering that most elderly people have poor vision, evacuation signs should be of large size. Gas leak alarm devices should be installed in kitchens and centralized storage tank rooms using gas as fuel, and buzzers should be installed outside the room or in areas that are easily audible to others such as the management room.

3. Use management requirements. Elderly care institutions should establish a safety management and fire prevention inspection system, strengthen the use of electric heating appliances and fireworks management, determine the personnel, content, location, and frequency of inspections and inspections, and conduct no less than two daily night fire prevention inspections in the premises. According to the "Regulations on Service Management of Social Welfare Institutions" issued by the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the proportion of nursing staff corresponding to elderly people in nursing homes who require primary care or above should reach around 4:1, and the proportion of nursing staff corresponding to healthy elderly people should be around 7:1. In the current situation where the contradiction between the increasing number of beds and the serious shortage of nursing staff cannot be solved at the moment, it is necessary to calculate and maintain the number of daily nursing staff proportionally based on the recent fire brigade alarm time, building evacuation conditions, allowable evacuation time in case of fire, and the number of elderly people. It is recommended that relevant national functional institutions provide reference values based on research and demonstration. Management and nursing personnel need to undergo fire safety training, master necessary fire safety knowledge and skills, and should organize centralized fire safety training for practitioners at least once every six months. At the same time, it is necessary to regularly carry out fire safety publicity and education activities for the elderly, constantly enhancing their awareness of fire safety and their ability to self rescue and escape. Elderly care institutions should develop fire extinguishing and emergency evacuation plans, and regularly conduct drills. In addition to personnel from their own units, emergency forces can rely on the community they are in and absorb key members of surrounding units and residents to participate. To classify and reasonably set up nursing areas, for buildings without ramps, elderly people with limited mobility should be placed on lower floors to facilitate evacuation; The number of elderly people in each room of a co living room should not exceed 3. A call signal device should be installed at the bedside, and the call signal should be directly sent to the management room. To prevent elderly people from slipping and falling, the window sill can be raised, but fences that affect evacuation and firefighting should not be set up in windows, balconies, and other areas; Fences and rolling shutter doors should not be installed on safety exits and public evacuation corridors. For night management purposes, access control systems can be used at safety exits, but reliable measures should be taken to ensure smooth evacuation of personnel in case of fire. In addition, equipping each elderly person with a small whistle, a flashlight, a white towel, and a glass of water by the bedside can also play a significant role in a fire.