How often does a fire watch make rounds?

Who sets the interval

The authority having jurisdiction. In Houston, the Fire Marshal’s Office decides what an approved fire watch looks like for a building whose system is out of service, and that often includes how frequently the affected areas must be walked. Where the authority has given a general direction rather than a number, the impairment coordinator sets the interval from the building’s fire plan, the size of the impaired area, the occupancy and any conditions in the insurer’s impairment permit. Price Protection writes the interval into the post orders and does not change it without the coordinator.

What a round covers

Every floor or area the impairment affects, walked in a route that passes every part of it: corridors, stairwells, mechanical rooms, storage, the places where a fire would start unseen. On each round the officer looks and smells for smoke and heat, checks that exits are clear and extinguishers and hose stations are in place, and looks for new hazards that appear when people know the system is down. The round is logged with its time and the areas covered, and the next round starts on the interval.

Between rounds

The officer stays where the plan puts them, usually at a point with a view of the most exposed area and near the phone or radio used to raise the alarm, and remains available for the coordinator and the contractor. On a small impairment the round and the interval may leave little time between; on a large building the officer may be walking almost continuously.

Hot work is different

A hot-work fire watch stays at the work: where the sparks land, the floor below an opening, the far side of a wall being cut. There is no interval because there is no leaving. After the work stops, the officer keeps the post-work period the permit sets, walking the area and the spaces heat could have reached. The fire watch rounds article covers routes, intervals and checkpoints in more detail.