Fire Safety Merit Badge

Welcome to Troop 325's Merit Badge Midway

Materials to bring to class:

Before you attend class:

Step 1: Plan Your Escape Today! Once a fire has started, there is NO time to plan how to get out. Sit down with your family TODAY and make a step-by-step plan for escaping your home safely.

Step 2: Draw a floor plan (birds-eye-view) of you home with clearly marked escape routes of each room. Indicate all doors and windows, as well as stairways, porches and porch roofs. Mark two ways out of every room, especially sleeping areas. Click here to download an Escape Plan Map grid.

Step 3: Establish a central meeting place outside your home. After escaping a fire, immediately find the meeting place and wait for the fire department to arrive. This meeting place allows a count of everyone in the household, which could then inform the fire department if anyone is missing or trapped inside the burning house. Never go back into a burning house for any reason, let trained fire fighters do their job!

Step 4: Practice, Practice, Practice your escape plan! Appoint a "fire chief" (typically father, mother, grandparent, etc.) to hold 'realistic' fire drills in the home and have everyone participate. Speed is vital, so get out quickly and carefully. Pretend some exits are blocked by fire & practice alternative escape routes. Test doors before opening them! While kneeling or crouching at the door feel the crack between the door and its frame and then reach up as high as you can and touch the door with the back of your hand. If you feel any warmth at all, do not open the door and use alternate escape route. If the door feels cool, wedge your foot so you can slightly open the door with caution. Note: As a precaution, sleep with bedroom doors closed. It helps to hold back heat and smoke. As you exit the home, remain low to the ground on your hands and knees, crawling low under the smoke. Smoke contains deadly gases and heat rises; therefore, cooler, cleaner air will be near the floor. If you are trapped, close all doors between you and the fire. Stuff cracks around the doors to keep smoke out. Wait at a window and signal for help. If there is a phone in the room, call 911 and report exactly where you are.

Step 5: Be Prepared! Make sure everyone in the household can unlock all doors and windows quickly, even in the dark. Windows or doors with security bars need to be equipped with quick-release devices, and everyone, including small children, should know how to use them.

At the end of the course, students shall have a basic understanding of:

ALSO... click here to see the 2003 Merit Badge class: http://www.sccfd.org/pub_ed/merit_badge.html

For fire and life safety information, please visit the Santa Clara County Fire Department at: www.sccfd.org