Data Center Health Emergency Initiative
Purpose
This initiative will enable data center personnel to access health-safety equipment more quickly during time-critical situations. The IDND-AMER team is looking to create faster access by installing data-center signage as part of our room 1 data center builds that will direct first responders to the nearest locations that offer first aid kits and Automated External Defibrillator (AED) devices.
Problem Statement
At present our data centers lack clear signage that informs personnel about the location of the nearest health-emergency equipment. This means that if an individual were to become injured or a health emergency should arise, the location of a first aid kit or AED device may not be known to that individual or to a first responder trying to assist. It should also be noted that not every location in the data center provides both items of equipment. So if an AED is needed, a responder would have to keep searching after arriving at a location that offered only a first aid kit.
The inability of personnel to quickly locate stations that provide the required equipment represents a safety risk in situations (such as someone suffering a cardiac arrest) when response time is critical. For example, the farthest point from a safety-equipment station in an AWS data center lies within the Red Zone (where customer data is stored and processed). In the best-case scenario (where an individual knows where life-saving equipment is located), it takes on average 90 seconds to go from the Red Zone location to the AED station. This means that it may take three minutes for a first responder to return with a defibrillator to assist someone suffering a cardiac arrest. This response time could be significantly longer if valuable minutes are spent searching for the AED station.
Delays can seriously undermine health outcomes: Research shows that in cases of cardiac arrest the chances of a successful outcome diminish by about 10% with every minute that passes (Source: Emergency Medicine Journal).
Solution
Directional signs in our data centers would guide people to the nearest AED/first-aid station. As well as saving time by providing clear directions, these signs raise awareness among data-center personnel about both the locations of emergency health care equipment and the type of assets available at each station.
Brady Tape will be used to make the directional signs. Brady tape is commonly used in facilities for directing foot traffic where OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) and ANSI (American National Standards Institute) regulations may apply. These signs would be labelled first aid/ AED and contain directional arrows pointing to the nearest emergency health care equipment. They would also indicate if there is an AED machine at that location or whether the AED machine is actually mounted in the data center.
These signs will be posted at all internal exits throughout the center, on the floor in entrances and also corridors that are intersecting. When it is necessary to offer continued direction inside larger spaces such as data halls and pods, the signs will be placed a maximum of 150ft apart. This solution will help create awareness in our data center prior to an injury or health emergency occurring. It will also ensure an individual involved in a health emergency can quickly locate and offer first-aid care as soon as possible.