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North Carolina Fire Extinguisher Requirements for Multi-Family Homes

Fire extinguisher laws can be hard to decipher on your own. The best way to verify you are in compliance with all laws is to contact your local office of the fire marshall. Each county has the fire marshalls listed and will give out the appropriate contact information in order to keep people safe and up to date. In North Carolina, the basic law is fairly standard, but each city and county can adjust the law as to the area's own specifications. These specs are never allowed to go below the state minimums, but can make requirements more stringent.

  1. Location of Extinguishers

    • Multifamily dwellings, including apartment complexes, are treated like places of work. The number of people in and out of the building make these facilities in need of tight security when it comes to potential fires. There must be a fire extinguisher within 75 feet of all points of the building, including hallways.

    Amount of Space

    • Each fire extinguisher can only be responsible for servicing a 3,000-square-foot area, maximum. If you place a fire extinguisher in the hall every 75 feet, the area behind the doorways cannot add up to more than that amount. It is sometimes necessary to put fire extinguishers within the walls of the apartments in order to comply with this particular spacing limitation. Depending on the size of the units, it can keep the number of extinguishers needed in the hallways down as well as provide easier access for the tenants.

    Rating of the Extinguisher

    • The fire extinguisher that must be placed every 75 feet should have a minimum rating of 2A-10BC, meaning the fire extinguisher is good for 10 square meters of a Class A fire --- one that is started by normal combustibles. The 10BC portion of the rating lets you know the extinguisher is good for 2.5 square meters of a Class B or C fire. Class B fires are from flammable liquids or combustibles and Class C fires are electrical. If you choose to put a higher-rated extinguisher that will more than fulfill the requirement, but this is the bare minimum that is required for multifamily dwellings.

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