Real life emergency

 

We encountered a real life emergency in our local IKEA store when we went shopping for a battery charger.  We found it readily enough so were contemplating making our way to the exit when emergency messages were relayed repeatedly to quickly leave the store by the nearest exit, leaving shopping behind.

 

We set off at my slow pace and were soon virtually alone as other fled in response to the alarm.  By this time we were walking the last 200 yards to the exit we were virtually alone with just one lone employee beckoning us to hurry.  Bron asked him for a wheelchair for me which they brought quite quickly and transferred me to fast moving wheels. The alarms were screaming for everyone to abandon all shopping and hasten to any exit of the building.  As we were the last and slowest customer I was soon transferred to a wheel chair and was pushed through the last corridors as the urgency increased.

 

We were accompanied by Hayley a relaxed and happy employee who seemed to have had all the necessary training  -  but time was short.  We were taken to an area of safe refuge in a huge stairwell.  This was very noisy, a bit cold and very large.  It vented to the open air and had huge and nosy fans which created a safe zone.  We were parked there on top of some floor lettering saying ‘disabled area’.   Hayley had her mobile phone and was in constant contact with management who said there were 5 fire engines outside and that they knew about us and where we were.  I lost count of time but it seemed lengthy.

 

Eventually a fireman and his mate arrived and contemplated carrying me down the stairwell as we were only one floor up. Hayley produced a low slung emergency chair and after some deliberations they decided I could be carried downstairs and outside. It took a while of transfer me to this very low chair, which I didn’t enjoy as they couldn’t possible understand about not bending me left knee etc.  They loaded me and set about carrying me down the steps. This was done to my astonishment quite swiftly and we were out of the loud noise of huge extractor fans and soon on our way out of the building.  It was then I discovered that Hayley alone had taken me down the steps on a tracked vehicle device while the firemen watched. It shows IKEA are well equipped and have well trained staff.

 

Of course this left our battery charger and other items still in the building and not yet bought.  So we had to go a second time.

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