PROTECTION, MUNICIPAL.
A stationary or portable device to enable people to escape from burning buildings when ordinary means of egress to the ground are destroyed or eat off by flames. The standard fire-escape used in America, and re quired by most city building laws, consists of balconies attached one above another to the out side of the building, connected by iron ladders with each other, and opening onto each floor at a door or window. Sueh fire-escapes are made entirely of iron, and one or more of them may be used according to the size of the building. Portable fire-escapes may be operated from the interior of the building or from the outside, ac cording to their character, Interior fire-escapes of this class vary in character from a simple knotted rope placed in each room, and down which the person seeking escape slides, to more elaborate devices, like canvas tubes. cables with slings. etc. The variety of such devices which have been patented and placed upon the market is enormous. Portable fire-escapes operated from the outside consist of ladders, telescopic tubes carrying slings, cables which may he thrown up into open windows, etc. One of the most prac
tical and effective of all of these devices is a simple ladder of sufficient length to reach from one story to the next, and provided with large hooks at one end which may be inserted over the window-sill. The first ladder is placed from the ground, the second from the top of the first, and so on until a line of ladders extends from the ground to the top floor, down which the occu pants of the building may descend alone or be carried by the firemen. The efficiency of all these devices in saving life depends largely upon, the coolness and self-possession of the endangered persons and those who are trying to aid them, and upon the device being maintained in working order, a matter that is often neglected. For these reasons various authorities on lire protec tion are Nailing more and more to advocate that reliance On safety fr lire sI Id be on fireproof eonstrnetion aided by till' 11.W of sta tionary tire-escapes of the first kind described.