The development of an emergency egress door is rather straight forward and simple. FEMA P-361 does not require the emergency egress door but leaves it up to the local authorities/ decision makers. However, if such an egress door is required, a minimum size is required. P-361, Page 3-11 (Design and Construction Guidance for Community Safe Rooms, August 2008) p) Where the applicable building code requires only one means of egress door, an emergency escape opening should be provided. The emergency escape opening should be an additional door or an opening that is a minimum of 5.7 square feet in area.

The FEMA guidelines for Tornado protection are numerated in FEMA P-361, Design and Construction Guidance for Community Safe Rooms, Second Edition, August 2008. Paragraph 8.10, entitled Standby Power on page 8-12 states: “The ICC-500 standard requires standby power systems to be designed to provide the required output capacity for a minimum of 2 hours and to support the mechanical ventilation system, when applicable.” Another US government agency, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in their Natural Disasters and Severe Weather – Tornado section stated: “Injury may result from the direct impact of a tornado, or it may occur afterward when

A couple of years ago I heard that an terrorist attack on the Belsan School in Russia on 1 September 2004 was a “dress rehearsal” for terrorist attacks on American schools. I started searching for the quote and found a book review (SOURCE) by Frank Borelli about a book entitled “Terror at Belsan: A Russian Tragedy with Lessons for America’s Schools ” written by John Giduck, published in 2005. The short version is the terrorists held the school for 3 days and Russian military attacked, resulting in a death toll of 385 (186 children, parents, 35 terrorists and 11 Special