[BNC-all] Update on last Thursday's evacuation

[Peroulis, Dimitrios]

Dear all

Last Thursday we had an alarm and the building was evacuated around 7pm. The alarm was caused by a small ammonia leak in a valve manifold box on the YES oven in the photolithography area.  This was corrected and taken off-line because this process is not used anymore.

Unfortunately the Burton Morgan center was locked at the time the alarm went off and despite a year-old request by the BNC to the Purdue police to have that building unlocked in such a scenario, the Burton Morgan center remained locked that evening. The cold weather led several people to go to the Bindley center. While many BNC staff responded to the emergency situation and I would like to personally thank them for that, communication was not effective to the people waiting in Bindley. This caused confusion, lots of wasted time, and frustration to everyone.

I would like to apologize for that inconvenience and wanted to assure everyone that we took immediate action to improve our plans. Specifically, here are the steps we are taking to avoid such an issue in the future:


1.       In event of a building evacuation alarm during normal business hours, please go to the Emergency Assembly Area as you currently do. A BNC staff member will meet you in that area and provide updates to the emergency situation. If you do not know the cause of the alarm, do not need help (e.g., not injured), and don't think that you can be of assistance in the emergency, you may remain there or feel free to leave the area.

2.       In the event of a building evacuation during off hours, you may either go to the Purdue Police Department (please see map below) or, if you do not know the cause of the alarm, do not need help (e.g., not injured), and don't think that you can be of assistance in the emergency, please feel free to leave the area and not go to the Emergency Assembly Area. Again, a BNC staff member will go to the EAA as soon as practical.

3.       Two additional staff members who live nearby have been added to the emergency responders, with the sole purpose of assisting in the Emergency Assembly Area. We are particularly thankful to Donna Brown and Jaime Turner for volunteering for this role. They are in the process of receiving the appropriate training.

4.       The BNC Building Emergency Plan (BEP) is being updated with the information above.

Thank you for all input you provided to help us improve our protocols.

Best
Dimitri

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________________________________________________________________________________
Dimitrios Peroulis
Professor, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Deputy Director, Birck Nanotechnology Center
Purdue University
1205 West State Street
West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057
tel: (765) 494-3491, fax: (765) 494-4731
email: dperouli at purdue.edu<mailto:dperouli at purdue.edu>
http://sites.google.com/site/peroulisteam/
________________________________________________________________________________

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