Due to the inherent risk of safety associated with fire, smoke, fumes, or even natural disaster events, building codes establish minimum criteria for the design of egress facilities. These criteria allow occupants to either promptly escape a building entirely or into a designated area of refuge. 

When egress is done right, ensuring proper life safety measures will save lives. When egress is done wrong, the lack of planning and foresight will only risk loss of lives.   

Driving this point home, the latest research from the National Fire Protection and Safety Association’s (NFPA) on fires in industrial and manufacturing properties between 2017 and 2021, found that:  

• Nearly 37,000 fires occurred during those four years
• 22% (roughly 8,000) were classified as structure fires
• 73% of injuries and 24% of deaths were related to structure fires
• 66% of direct property damage was related to structure fires
• 23% of structure fires started in processing and manufacturing areas or workrooms
• Equipment or heat source failure was a leading cause of structure fires
• Direct property damage amounted to $1.6 billion

Egress Codes and Compliance

Architects, general contractors, and building owners are tasked with providing an environment designed to protect the occupants in the event of an emergency. Fortunately, detailed performance and prescriptive national codes are in play to define and guide effective manual egress and life safety practices. The codes contain clear rules which serve to define conforming and non-conforming egress.

The basic requirement of egress is to provide “A continuous and unobstructed way of travel from any point in a building or structure to a public way”. However, there is no singular code specification that defines full compliance. Full compliance for egress relative to doors include multiple areas of consideration including:

• Occupancy and classification of space
• Accessibility: minimum dimensions for door and travel path, travel distance, and continuity
• Door type: swinging, sliding, revolving, power-operated, or fire rated
• Operation: opening force requirements, number of functions, prior knowledge, and swing directions

Unfortunately, however, the highly comprehensive egress codes issued by the NFPA, IBC, and OSHA are often overlooked, misunderstood, or not properly executed.

• Noncompliance can create a potential hazard for employees and risk loss of life, creating potential liability for responsible parties, not to mention possibly jeopardizing architect licensure.

“Fortunately, there is virtually always a solution for compliance, even when a specialty door is required,” points out Bob Atterson, Director of Controlled Environments Segment for High Performance Doors, 4Front Engineered Solutions (parent company of the Dynaco brand of high-performance roll up doors).

Egress option provides "full code compliance"

Dynaco offers a code-compliant manual egress option for several of its high-speed roll up doors.

“The Dynaco egress option is ideal for almost any controlled environment including food and beverage processing, life science, and electronics environments where there are a lot of areas of separation,” explains Atterson. “And by code, when a powered door is the only access to a room, a manual means of escape is required.”

However, he emphasizes, “it’s important to remember that there’s a big difference between a manual door release and a compliant means of egress.” Swing doors, for example, are generally the preferred door solution for egress, but there isn’t always adequate space to accommodate them. In these situations, Dynaco’s fabric roll up doors eliminate the need for secondary doors, providing a code-compliant solution.

The Dynaco egress option benefits are:

• Prevents panic: users require no special training, tools, or prior knowledge to use the door.
• Easy to push opening: the door is side-hinged and opens in the direction of egress with no upward or horizontal sliding action, risking potential for failure or reliance on complicated counterweight and pulley systems.
• Low operating force: requires less than 30 lbs. of force to fully open the egress door.
• Hazard-free movement: there are no thresholds or trip hazards to impede human movement.
• Integrated control system: works with the egress sensor to stop the door when egress is opened.

The egress option’s unique T-shaped design divides the fabric door panel into three distinct sections which are held together with zippers. When pushed using minimal force at the clearly labeled locations on the door fabric, the zippered sections will immediately break away and release, thereby creating a highly reliable and effective — and truly code-compliant — means of emergency egress.

“The egress option also meets all relevant code requirements, whether prescriptive (the way a door opens) or performance (how much force is required to open a door). It’s much more effective than hook and loop designs that require a considerable amount of force to open and which can harbor bacteria, especially in clean room environments,” Atterson says.

He further comments, “Dynaco’s code compliance has been validated by third-party analysis via independent fire protection engineering and code consulting firm Koffel Associates, Inc.”

91-door application meets all fire code requirements

A large application of Dynaco’s high-speed roll up doors is found at a biomanufacturing facility in Research Triangle Park, N.C..
The company is installing a total of 91 Dynaco Streamline Roll Up Doors with the code-compliant egress option, providing access in and out of a variety of processing rooms. The Streamline doors can cycle anywhere from six times per week to as much as 60 times per day depending on the level of a room’s activity.

Material traffic flow issue solved

The company's Research Triangle Park facility contained corridors with multiple processing suites that were equipped with independent airlocks separated with conventional, manually-operated swing doors.

Adding to that challenge, facility technicians must manually transfer heavy plastic totes on wheels that can carry up to 1,200 lbs. of buffer solutions as well as various types of portable, process equipment and accessories. The facility’s previous metal swing doors resulted in an awkward traffic flow for moving such large and bulky containers.

The metal swing doors were subject to considerable wear and tear and required someone to hold them open when totes were being moved from room to room. Now, the facility’s Dynaco Streamline roll up doors operate automatically via an access card reader or hand wave wall switch for easy room access via the programmable auto opening and closing feature. This auto opening/closing feature also prevents activating differential pressure alarms.

Utilizing Dynaco Streamline doors prevented the company from having to install 30 emergency exits, saving a considerable amount of money as well as saving much needed room and wall space.

Dynaco’s commitment to excellence

Founded in 1987, the Dynaco brand has a strong heritage and a wealth of expertise as a high-speed fabric roll up door company. We’re committed to achieving excellence in quality and performance through a certified and dedicated network of dealers while providing outstanding service to customers throughout the world. The Dynaco Streamline Roll Up Door with code-compliant egress option demonstrates that level of commitment to our customers.

For more information about Dynaco’s code-compliant egress option for our Streamline Roll Up Door, call us at 800.459.1930, or contact Dynaco here for answers to your questions about our entire line of high performance doors.