Panic Hardware for Industrial Occupancy Exit?

1/30/2020

Are exits in industrial occupancies required to have panic hardware if the overall number of employees is 50 or more?

This is under NFPA 101 Life Safety Code, 2018 edition. Thanks.

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2 Comments

Tom

1/30/2020 10:04:31 am

Yes they are required

Jimmy Landmesser, Jr.

1/30/2020 03:41:31 pm

Not necessarily. There are other pieces of information necessary to answer your question.

NFPA 101 (2018) has four instances where panic hardware is required on egress doors:

1. Assembly occupancies with an occupant load of 100 people or more [12.2.2.2.3 and 13.2.2.2.3]
2. Educational occupancies with an occupant load of 100 people or more [14.2.2.2.2 and 15.2.2.2.2]
3. Day care occupancies with an occupant load of 100 people or more [16.2.2.2.2 and 17.2.2.2.2]
4. High hazard occupancies with an occupant load of more than five (5) people [7.11.7]

You need to have at least 100 occupants for #1-3. If it is high hazard, you almost guaranteed to require panic hardware. You could have 200 people in a building, but if there is not a single room or area that has an occupant load of 100 or more and none of the spaces are high hazard then panic hardware would not be required.

The IBC is where 50 persons is the limit for requiring panic hardware for similar situations.

If you have any more details, this question could be answered a little better than "it depends".

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Panic Hardware for Industrial Occupancy Exit?

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