A frail woman in her 90s used her body weight to force open two retirement village doors and help a friend outside when the fire alarm sounded.

KEVIN STENT/STUFF Village at the Park, where there was a small fire on Saturday forcing its elderly residents to evacuate from their rooms into the rain.

The handling of the fire alarm on Saturday night, as the All Blacks played France, has residents looking at starting a petition to address concerns at Arvida Group-run Village at the Park in Berhampore, Wellington.

Management of the village have confirmed managers, who live on site from Monday to Friday, were in Wairarapa for the weekend. They got notification of the alarm as soon as it sounded and staff on duty were alerted to it via a call from those managers.

Sam Treister, a community care worker with the aged, had talked to a "frail" woman in her 90s, who went to evacuate from her room but checked on her neighbour with reduced mobility due to ulcerated legs. That neighbour begged her not to leave her.

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So the elderly woman helped her neighbour. Two sets of heavy doors, usually left open, were shut and the woman used her own body weight to force them open.

Residents gathered outside, some in nighties and pyjamas, in the rain.

The village routinely held drills which worked like "clockwork" but these were done in daytime with management on site.

Arvida Group chief executive Bill McDonald confirmed there were no mangers on site at Village at the Park during the weekend.

One warden was heard muttering "this is shambolic, it's chaotic" during Saturday's evacuation, Treister said.

Residents, led by one with a legal background, were looking at starting a petition aimed at stopping a similar situation, she said.

Arvida Group chief executive Bill McDonald said it appeared a resident had left a pot on the stove unattended. While there was smoke, there were no flames.

"In the independent living area we run drills so people are capable of evacuating in an orderly [way]," he said.

The fire doors had shut when the alarm started and this was what was supposed to happen, he said.

"Everything that should work did work."

KEVIN STENT/STUFF An elderly woman had to use her body weight to open doors as she helped another resident out of Village at the Park in Berhampore, Wellington, when a fire alarm sounded on Saturday night.

He confirmed there was no management on site during the weekend but there were staff on-site in the village's rest home and dementia unit. Managers only lived on-site during the working week.

They had been notified on their phones as soon as the alarm sounded. Their subsequent call to staff were the first they knew of the fire, though would have likely soon found out via other means.

The independent living quarters, where the alarm went off, were not routinely staffed. He understood some staff from the dementia and resthome areas had gone to help.

There would be an informal review to check staff, management, and residents acted as they should but it appeared all had worked how it should, he said. Fire crews were on site within four minutes of the alarm sounding.

Management at Village at the Park would be discussing concerns with residents early this week.

He was not aware of the rumoured petition.

A Fire and Emergency New Zealand spokesman said the village had an approved evacuation plan.