In the wake of last night's fatal fire at a Rhode Island nightclub and a stampede earlier this week at a Chicago venue, safety measures at clubs nationwide will likely be reevaluated. What measures should be taken in Boston to ensure the safety of its nightspots? What lessons can be learned -- by venue owners and concertgoers alike -- in terms of safety at clubs? .

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Building Codes Should include a special provision for night clubs just like they do daycares and other higher risk environments. The current regulations do not adequately address the massive number of people that are needing to escape in a darkend space without prior knowledge of where exits are located. Complete evacuation of this type of building should be attainable in minutes. Imagine how many people would have been saved if they had three or four addional double egress doors with panic release hardware through the exterior walls to the street. Nightclub owners should also be mandated to identify the flammability risk of there facility and be mandated to have the facility within a defined standard.

Martin , Needham

God rest their souls! Our hearts go out to all the victims and their families. May this never ever happen again. I truely hope the owners insurance can some how compensate the families for their loss.

Barry , Peterborough

Not a problem here.Boston is too blue blooded for metal bands, that why they had to go to R.I. Boston is too uptight a place for heavy metal bands who use pyrotechnics.

Sean, Holbrook,MA

first, my thoughts & prayers go out to the victims and the families. Next, these tragic events will ALWAYS happen, no matter how much or what what type of preventive measures are taken. Since the Coconut Crove tradgedy, there have been several other "large loss of life" incidents and after today, there will be more. There have been millions of events with hundreds of attendies since the early 1900's. Face it, it's a statistic, albeit a bad one. Unforunately.

jc, quincy

More exits with well lit signs.

John , Brighton

Everyone is writing about what these poor people should or should not have done last night, and maybe now they wouldn't be lost. Yet, 95% of you are over an hour away, and this is just something you are witnessing over television. This accident occured three miles from my house. You could see the smoke from my front steps. And close to 90 people are dead. In Rhode Island, a small and close state, every RI native will know at least one person who suffered a fatality in this disaster. How many times do you go out to dinner and look for the nearest fire exit? If you walked into a restaurant and the host showed you where to go in case of a fire after he seats you, will you really have a comfortable dinner afterwards? No one wants to think of disaster, everyone thinks it can't happen to them. All the laws and regulations could not prevent people from being trapped. Are we going to ban all flamables from night clubs? So people can go to the corner bar for some H20? We need to learn from this, and grow, but we can't point fingers and blame. Many things went wrong last night, but many things go wrong without incident. My heart and tears go out to all the friends and relatives of the missing loved ones.

UNK, Warwick, RI

NO LIVE FLAME SHOULD EVER BVE USED BY EITHER THE PERSSORMERS OR THE CLUB, tHE LESSON OF THE TRAGIC COCONUT GROVE FIRE IN BOSTON 53 YEARS AGO SHOULD REMAIN A CONSTANT REMINDER TO OFFICIALS AND INSPECTOR . tHEY SHOULD SHARE THE RESPONSIBILITY BOTH FINANCIALLY AND EMOTIONALLY WITH THE VICTIMS. IN THE BOSTON FIRE, THE OWNER WAS SENT TO JAIL, A SMALL PRICE TP PAY FOR THE LOSS OF 495 LIVES...

Bob , Beverly Mass

First dont go see washed up bands like Great White and as a safety measure everyone should carry oxygen tanks and pocketbook size fire extinguishers

Jami, Woburn

1.door men (who collect money and check I.D.s) should inform incomers as to where the exits are. 2.Sprinklers should be required in all buildings that hold any number of people no matter what the square footage is.

Lisa , Somerville

Safety should be first and foremost when addressing any crowd in any venue. When are we going to give a safety "briefing" when people congregate ? When I go to business meetings, the first thing discussed is where the exits are in case of an emergency. In our workplace, we all know where the exits are, and local building codes mandate that we illuminate exits and "talk the talk" about informing people what to do in an emergency. The pyrotechnics thing just "blows my mind" that someone didn't know about this before setting them off. Unfortunately we obviously are still a long way from providing basic safety for people in any environment.

David , Wakefield, MA