Posts by Rob French

Traditional fire drills, which require hundreds of building occupants to gather in stairwells and in assembly areas, are problematic during a pandemic. Even after public officials authorize a return to full occupancy, tenants in high-rise office buildings will remain leery of participating in drills for the foreseeable future. To help buildings maintain their life safety…

With a widely available vaccine to COVID-19 not expected for another 12 to 18 months at the earliest, commercial office property managers will be challenged to maintain their life safety and risk management programs. Gathering people together for fire drills and staff & floor warden training is now untenable, and yet buildings remain responsible for…

With the end of stay-at-home orders approaching in many states, property and facility teams are focusing on how building operations will need to adapt during the pandemic’s next phase. Until a Covid-19 vaccine is widely available (at least a year from now, and likely longer), the risk of infection will remain high even in already…

With states extending the duration of their stay-at-home orders from weeks to months (now into June in some locations), many property teams are adjusting building operations to reflect an extended period of low to no occupancy.  From a health and life safety perspective, the two main considerations are air and water, but property teams are…

Now that many major US jurisdictions are making big moves to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus, property teams need to begin moving into the next phase of their response. Most office buildings have already implemented the initial response procedures (escalating cleaning protocols, educating tenants, encouraging work from home, etc.).  The second phase involves…

With the Covid-19 coronavirus spreading within the United States, now is a good time for property and facility managers to review their pandemic preparedness plans. Basic protocols for infectious diseases help minimize transmission between building occupants, reassure tenants that management is doing all it can to protect their health and safety, and reduce business disruption…

Terrorist attacks and active shooter events garner extensive media attention, but in terms of lives lost, property damage, and overall social disruption, weather-related disasters dwarf man-made incidents. With World Meteorological Day quickly approaching (March 23), we thought it was an opportune time to provide some context for weather-related disasters: As was noted extensively in recent…

(Chicago) – KVCL Safety, Inc., the Chicago market leader in fire and life safety training, has been acquired by AK Preparedness, a national emergency preparedness planning and training firm. “Combining our operations with AK makes great sense at this point in our company’s evolution,” says Leo Cox, a KVCL founding principal. “We’ve partnered with AK…

It’s been quite a year for natural and man-made disasters in this country: the costliest wildfire season in US history, three Category 4 hurricanes, and the worst mass shooting in US history to name a few. At least 16 natural disasters made the billion-dollar-damage list, tying the record set in 2011. This month alone, more…