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Nightclubs and Bars in Brazil: Disasters waiting
I live in large city in Brazil, close to the size of Rio de Janeiro. I'm a college student, so I usually attend clubs and bars here and obviously have been to clubs in other cities here. The story is the same as the one in Santa Maria, RS: clubs and bars here have no safety infrastructure.
The great majority of clubs here have one small entrance, usually the size of a common house door, with a couple of bouncers. Inside there are no fire extinguishers visible, the ceilings are usually low and filled with the normally used club lighting, wires exposed and all tangled up, power plugs with as many as six or seven equipments, or how ever many they can plug on top of each other.
As to the exits, there are no signs, or any indication at all as to emergency exits, and that is because usually there isn't one. And if you actually see one, more times than not, it will be chained and locked. If you are going to leave, you will probably use the door you came through in the first place.
Capacity is another issue, if the establishment is fit for 300 people, there will be 1000, or more. They allow in the number of people willing to pay, if it will be too crowded and unsafe, not their problem. If there are minors getting in and buying liquor, a blind eye is turned as quickly as you can say "I.D.". If the club is not properly built for any kind of pyrotechnics, but the band or the D.J. playing has it as part of their show, they will make it happen no matter what the consequences, because it will draw out more customers.
And what about the proper authorities, who should be in charge of controlling, inspecting these places. God only knows how many times a year they show up, and when they do, my guess is that a proper job is not being made, and like on many other things in Brazil, money talks, and if a club doesn't obeyed by the proper rules, it's nothing that a couple of thousand bucks won't solve.
Corruption here, as always, is a major issue, and sometimes, like this one in Santa Maria, has cost lives. And there, like many other clubs and places of entertainment here, money is priority, since bouncers prohibited customers from leaving a building on fire until they had paid their bill, because apparently fifty bucks is worth more than a human life.
In the pics, clubs here in Brazil, demonstrating the one door entrance/exit, the overcrowding, the overabundance of lights and the lack of exits. The first 3 pics are from a club in Belo Horizonte, Brazil called "De Puta Madre", the two in the middle of random clubs in Brazil, and the last 3 of another club in Belo Horizonte, called Swingers.
The great majority of clubs here have one small entrance, usually the size of a common house door, with a couple of bouncers. Inside there are no fire extinguishers visible, the ceilings are usually low and filled with the normally used club lighting, wires exposed and all tangled up, power plugs with as many as six or seven equipments, or how ever many they can plug on top of each other.
As to the exits, there are no signs, or any indication at all as to emergency exits, and that is because usually there isn't one. And if you actually see one, more times than not, it will be chained and locked. If you are going to leave, you will probably use the door you came through in the first place.
Capacity is another issue, if the establishment is fit for 300 people, there will be 1000, or more. They allow in the number of people willing to pay, if it will be too crowded and unsafe, not their problem. If there are minors getting in and buying liquor, a blind eye is turned as quickly as you can say "I.D.". If the club is not properly built for any kind of pyrotechnics, but the band or the D.J. playing has it as part of their show, they will make it happen no matter what the consequences, because it will draw out more customers.
And what about the proper authorities, who should be in charge of controlling, inspecting these places. God only knows how many times a year they show up, and when they do, my guess is that a proper job is not being made, and like on many other things in Brazil, money talks, and if a club doesn't obeyed by the proper rules, it's nothing that a couple of thousand bucks won't solve.
Corruption here, as always, is a major issue, and sometimes, like this one in Santa Maria, has cost lives. And there, like many other clubs and places of entertainment here, money is priority, since bouncers prohibited customers from leaving a building on fire until they had paid their bill, because apparently fifty bucks is worth more than a human life.
In the pics, clubs here in Brazil, demonstrating the one door entrance/exit, the overcrowding, the overabundance of lights and the lack of exits. The first 3 pics are from a club in Belo Horizonte, Brazil called "De Puta Madre", the two in the middle of random clubs in Brazil, and the last 3 of another club in Belo Horizonte, called Swingers.
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