Comment on Why do so many UK electrical sockets have an on/off switch next to them?

• BuboScandiacus@mander.xyz ⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  You can lock yourself in with the other type too.

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  • cecilkorik@lemmy.ca ⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    No you can’t. You can lock yourself out, but a typical residential house built to code in North America has a latch handle that always turns from the inside, even when locked, and usually unlocks by doing so to prevent accidental lock-outs. And likewise if the door has a deadbolt, it must have a deadbolt with a handle on the inside. Most other kinds of locks are also easily accessible and removed by hand from the inside. The point is that they can’t require a key from the inside, because if you can’t find the key then you are locked inside and in thick smoke and fire that the key may be impossible to reach. If any egress door requires a key to unlock from the inside it is considered a serious fire hazard and will never pass a code inspection. (Of course, foolish people can still add them later but you can’t prevent stupid and it’s still a fire hazard not to mention impractical)

    These types of building code and fire code rules are typically written in blood. People have died because of this.

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    • avattar@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      All house doors/egress doors in Brazil require keys to unlock. BUT (and it’s a big but) most houses here are made of bricks, with ceramic roofs.

      It does make sense to have easy-to-escape houses when they are built of flammable materials with an accelerant for a roof.

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