Current Events > I saw a news story just now about fire drills in elementary schools

(+) Yeah! (+)

Suddenly remembered our school having the drill and we were led to a small trail behind the school into the bushes basically

Looking back... man if the fire was bad we would be screwed

You don't love the smell of napalm in the morning?

In both elementary and high school, the drill led us to one of the parking lots, depending on where in the school we were at the time.

Throwing kids into the woods to escape a fire seems like a poor choice.

That's a weird choice for sure. Our fire drills always had us go to the parking lot

oh man, this just reminded me that my elementary school had the weirdest drills
-fire drill, basically the same as you described. the school building was surrounded by "the black top" which was concrete, and we'd basically walk into the grass + woods right beyond that
-tornado drill, teachers would close the steel gates behind the windows (like what store fronts have), and we'd all go into the center room of the building
-post-911, we'd have the "hide in place" drill, where all the lights were turned off, doors locked, and we'd all gather under a giant red frowny face taped to the ceiling
-flood drill, the custodial staff would cut the electricity of the building and students would have to sit on top of their desk to avoid getting taken away by the flash flood
-invader drill, similar to the "hide in place" drill, except we would be assigned a buddy and be required to hide under a desk instead of the giant red frowny face
-siren testing, happens monthly in my city*, but the school siren was tested once every other week. basically we would be outside playing at recess, and when the siren went off we had to find our buddy, go back to the classroom, and then do the invader drill

*when the city tests it, they only test to see if it works. we're not required to go inside, lol. that would be crazy.

BucketCat posted...

oh man, this just reminded me that my elementary school had the weirdest drills
-fire drill, basically the same as you described. the school building was surrounded by "the black top" which was concrete, and we'd basically walk into the grass + woods right beyond that
-tornado drill, teachers would close the steel gates behind the windows (like what store fronts have), and we'd all go into the center room of the building
-post-911, we'd have the "hide in place" drill, where all the lights were turned off, doors locked, and we'd all gather under a giant red frowny face taped to the ceiling
-flood drill, the custodial staff would cut the electricity of the building and students would have to sit on top of their desk to avoid getting taken away by the flash flood
-invader drill, similar to the "hide in place" drill, except we would be assigned a buddy and be required to hide under a desk instead of the giant red frowny face
-siren testing, happens monthly in my city*, but the school siren was tested once every other week. basically we would be outside playing at recess, and when the siren went off we had to find our buddy, go back to the classroom, and then do the invader drill

*when the city tests it, they only test to see if it works. we're not required to go inside, lol. that would be crazy.

Jesus!? Where do you live?
The frowny face thing is kinda weird.

As a current HS teacher, we do fire drills monthly. Just herd the kids out to designated zones 30ft or so from the building.

After the drills, we're instructed to remind students of our emergency procedure protocol "ALICE"

Alert (If you see something, say something. You have the right to call 911 in good faith)
Lockdown (Lock door, barricade with desks and heavy furniture, stay scattered in the room not bunched up in a corner)
Inform (No code red/blue/yellow, clear information over PA about the current situation)
Counter (Moving around, throwing objects, engaging the assailant to disorient/disarm)
Evacuate (If the assailant is in a far part of the building, escape instead of hiding if possible)

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/2/222f8aec.jpg

Satellite view shows that spot is still there. In 6th grade most of our classes were in those buildings to the left so we just marched into that trail

Used to be a lot more brush around the school, cleared up a bunch

SiO4 posted...

Jesus!? Where do you live?
The frowny face thing is kinda weird.

michigan, like 15-20 min outside of Detroit.

In grade school I found the fire alarm to be upsetting, mainly because of how startling it was. Students just weren't notified of drills happening.

BucketCat posted...

michigan, like 15-20 min outside of Detroit.

Ya, that would explain that.
~Holy shit!!

There was one time there actually was a fire. We left thinking it was a drill, even the teacher. Then we saw smoke coming from the cafeteria and were like "uhhhhh".

Everyone was fine.

My first ever earthquake drill was odd. Never did those when I was young because of where I lived. Now we do them a few times a year in Vegas.

I remember just being herded to the football field/playground area.

I always hated fire drills as a kid because our fire alarms were these super loud buzzers that could wake the dead. Hearing them go off suddenly was startling. Every year during Fire Prevention month (October) the fire department would put on a super fire drill where they would fill the hallways with fake smoke and take a few kids during the drill to see if the teachers would come looking for them.

bigtiggie23 posted...

Every year during Fire Prevention month (October) the fire department would put on a super fire drill where they would fill the hallways with fake smoke and take a few kids during the drill to see if the teachers would come looking for them.

That's hard core.

psh we used to have nuclear bomb drills

Did you feel that earthquake about an hour ago TC?

Just climb the trees. Fire can't climb

We all just met up at the malt shoppe

YugiNoob posted...

Did you feel that earthquake about an hour ago TC?

Yeah, made a topic about but it got lost

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwYGTSim2Z8

bigtiggie23 posted...

Every year during Fire Prevention month (October) the fire department would put on a super fire drill where they would fill the hallways with fake smoke and take a few kids during the drill to see if the teachers would come looking for them.

I'm imagining this as the fire fighters just grabbing kids like Legend of the Hidden Temple.

the only fire drill we did was the time there was an actual fire in the abandoned textile factory across the street. thankfully it wasn't the chem factory on the other side.