What is a muster point?
A muster point is the place a site tells people to gather in an emergency so they can be accounted for; it does the same job as an assembly point under a different name.
Also called assembly point, assembly area, refuge or safe area
What it means.
The word muster does not appear in 29 CFR 1910.38, in the construction equivalent at 1926.35, or in the nonmandatory appendix to Subpart E of Part 1910. OSHA's guidance says assembly areas, and the appendix says refuge or safe areas. Many sites use the word muster, and it is what people search for, but it is not OSHA's word.
So OSHA sets no muster point requirements: no location, no distance, no sign and no time limit. What it requires is procedures to account for all employees after evacuation. Anything more specific comes from the site's own plan, a fire code, a state plan, an insurer or a client.
Procedures to account for all employees after evacuation;
Where it shows up on a job.
Sites post the muster point on evacuation maps and at the gate, keep a second one in case the main one is unsafe, and practice the count there during drills.
Where this comes from.
Each source was read on 22 October 2026. Guidance is advice; a regulation is the rule.
- 29 CFR 1910.38Code of Federal Regulations, Title 29. Regulation. Emergency action plans, including the duty to account for employees after evacuation.
- 29 CFR 1926.35Code of Federal Regulations, Title 29. Regulation. The construction emergency action plan standard.
- Appendix to Subpart E of Part 1910Code of Federal Regulations, Title 29. Nonmandatory appendix to a regulation. Refuge or safe areas, and the one-warden-per-twenty guideline.
- Evacuation Plans and Procedures eTool, emergency action plan elementsOccupational Safety and Health Administration. OSHA guidance, advisory. Assembly areas, head counts and accounting for visitors.
A plain-language definition, not legal advice. For a decision on your site, read the standard that applies to it.
Related terms
- assembly point
An assembly point is the place people go after they leave a building in an emergency, so someone can find out who made it out and who did not.
- refuge or safe area
Refuge or safe area is the term in OSHA's nonmandatory evacuation appendix for the place people go during an evacuation, inside another part of the building or outside, away from the emergency.
- headcount
A headcount is the check, after people have left, that everyone who should be accounted for is, with the names and last known locations of anyone missing passed to whoever is in charge.
- roll call
A roll call is reading names aloud at the assembly point to find out who is missing; it is one way of doing a headcount.
Read moreWhat OSHA requires at a muster point
In PanoraEmergency muster: Start an event, account for everyone at the muster point on a tablet, and keep the after-action report.