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Jan
7
Daley Center Fire Drill
Filed Under urban peril
I haven’t been in a fire drill for quite time, so it was a surprise — but not that large of a surprise because I heard a staffer give a clerk a three minute warning of the impending drill — when a fire drill was held at the Daley Center in Chicago. The 11th floor occupants took emergency stairwells to the 10th floor where clerk’s offices are located, as per loud speaker instructions that were clear and concise. After everyone was gathered, an all clear was given by security staff and everyone went back to their original rooms on the 11th floor. Our room was in the middle of a court call, so everything started back up as soon as attorneys, defendants, court staff and the judge were in place.
A fire drill is certainly a better situation than what happened in January 2004 when I was at the City-County building in Indianapolis. A co-worker and I had driven down to Indy from South Bend and had just exited an elevator on the 5th floor near the circuit court. The alarm sounded and a sheriff’s deputy came running by to announce that the alarm wasn’t a drill. My co-worker and I found a stairwell with an emergency alarm bar that immediately sounded as soon as we opened the door. As we entered the stairwell, we could see police officers running up the stairs as streams of people were traveling down to the first level to evacuate. We could smell smoke — never a good thing. It turned out there was a trash fire in the basement. The evacuation was orderly and we were given the “all-clear” after watching firemen enter and exit the building after about a half-hour.
