Las Vegas Firefighters Make Good Use of The Fontaine-Bust

October 20, 2009 at 11:57 AM | by juliana | 0 Comments

We hate to be a Debbie Downer but fires happen all the time in Las Vegas on the Strip. Most are small and rarely put anyone in danger. But some are big, like The Monte Carlo's fire in early 2008 and the tragic MGM Grand and Bally's fires in the 1980s.

For guests staying in these massive hotels with 1,000+ rooms, knowing your emergency escape route is important. Yet you'll also be glad to hear that the Las Vegas Fire Department is getting some extra training in the skeleton of the unfinished Fontainebleau Hotel, just south of Encore.

The Las Vegas Sun reports that new training drills are being conducted for the entire fire department inside the hotel with a full-scale simulated fire planned for November.

Training inside the Fontainebleau--which is still unfinished and has no real plans to start back up again--allows firefighters to drill for multiple days without having to work around staff, hotel guests and the general chaos of a casino hotel. Here's what the firefighters are working on:

Beyond dousing flames, the main challenges of fighting high-rise fires are managing the arrival of new fire crews outside the hotel, cordoning off and controlling the lobby so tourists and staff can be evacuated and firefighters can get in, finding engineers and security staff who can explain the property and give firefighters control of the service elevators (which go to all floors and have higher carrying capacities than passenger elevators....)

This is some assuring news and we're glad to see the Fontaine-Bust could be of use to the city, instead of just being an eyesore.

Hopefully, there won't be another large-scale fires in town but just in case, make sure you review the escape plan for your hotel. It's usually listed on the back of the room door and in the in-room directory book.

VegasChatter

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