London Fire and Aftermath RIP

GM228

Peregrinus wrote: »

Modern high-rise buildings have "dry risers" - water pipes with an inlet at ground level, outside the building, which travel up the building and have outlets inside the building on every floor. In normal conditions, they're empty (hence the name). When there's a fire, the fire brigade can hook up a (mobile) tank of water at the inlet, and pump it up. Firemen on any floor inside the building can connect a hose to the outlet, and away they go.

With such an intense fire you would wonder would such a system reliably work in upper levels - would the fire/heat bend or crack the pipes especially when cold water in the pipes reacts with the intense heat of the metal piping, although pictures from inside the building seem to show metal piping undamaged.

They can also connect multiple hoses together and run them within the building if no dry risers, once there is sufficient pressure they can in theory do this all the way to the top floor.

27 tower blocks now reportedly failed fire safety tests, will they all be evacuated??

tara73

ah, yes, the dry risers.
but they would then only work with fire inside the building, it wouldn't be of any use for fire on the outside, like we had it on Grenfell?

GM228

tara73 wrote: »

ah, yes, the dry risers.
but they would then only work with fire inside the building, it wouldn't be of any use for fire on the outside, like we had it on Grenfell?

It would certainly help to try to contain the fire from entering the apartments/further apartments, problem is by the time such a system is set up and running the fire is most likely already on the inside of the apartments.

iguana

There was some footage of fire-fighters on top of nearby low-rise blocks aiming hoses up and across at the higher stories of Grenfell. But i think for the most part they could do little more than speed up the process of the fire burning itself out.

tara73

tara73 wrote: »

ah, yes, the dry risers.
but they would then only work with fire inside the building, it wouldn't be of any use for fire on the outside, like we had it on Grenfell?

hmm, surely they can (theorethically as we learned) go to windows with their hoses and put the fire out from above.

flyingsnail

do they not have high rise nozzels like they do in the US?

http://r1.firehouse.com/files/base/image/FHC/2014/05/16x9/640x360/high-rise-7-14-photo-1-high-ri_11490306.jpg

silverharp

tara73 wrote: »

and what would that bring? if you look at Grenfell Tower, the flames spread so quickly to the upper floors, litterally in seconds. If you put firefighters and their relevant equipment on every affectetd Tower, it might work, but just a person to monitor? Don't think so.

whatever it takes, have a fire tender at each site, a couple of firemen, police an electrical engineer, make sure the building is riddled with fire alarms have extinguishers on every floor and train up some of the residents even.
Sure the fire spread quickly but I bet a lot of time was lost between the fridge catching fire and the alarm being raised plus the time to get the fire service to arrive.

tara73

silverharp wrote: »

whatever it takes, have a fire tender at each site, a couple of firemen, police an electrical engineer, make sure the building is riddled with fire alarms have extinguishers on every floor and train up some of the residents even.

this things take a bit of time to install, at least if they want to do it properly this time. It's not done in one day.

silverharp wrote: »

Sure the fire spread quickly but I bet a lot of time was lost between the fridge catching fire and the alarm being raised plus the time to get the fire service to arrive.

I saw a documentary where it was said the firemen put out the fridge, didn't realised the fire had spread to the outside and when they got out, the cladding was already ablaze over 2 stories or more.
fire service to arrive?? they where already there!
if not having done so, you need to watch the many available videos on youtube how quickly that fire spread!

GM228

silverharp wrote: »

whatever it takes, have a fire tender at each site, a couple of firemen, police an electrical engineer, make sure the building is riddled with fire alarms have extinguishers on every floor and train up some of the residents even.
Sure the fire spread quickly but I bet a lot of time was lost between the fridge catching fire and the alarm being raised plus the time to get the fire service to arrive.

But there are 100s of sites accross the country, such a move would not realistically be viable as it would severely tie up an already stretched fire bridgade. It would require 100s of vehicles and people to be semi-permanently outstationed.

To be honest if I was told I was in a potentially unsafe building I'm not sure such a presence would reassure me - especially when we look how quickly Grenfell spread. I would rather be out and and return when I knew it was safer.

Many of the residents in Chalcots are saying it's a disgrace they were evacuated - but imagine if they didn't and a fire did start there and many were killed, people would complain it was a disgrace they hadn't been evacuated when it was known they were unsafe - and manslaughter could come into play for the council. Weather it be out of fear for criminal charges or a genuine fear for residents safety the evacuation of such buildings is the only true course of action. Having a presence of fire bridgade etc in case of a fire does not guarantee safety of lives, only evacuation does.

mikeybrennan

silverharp wrote: »

whatever it takes, have a fire tender at each site, a couple of firemen, police an electrical engineer, make sure the building is riddled with fire alarms have extinguishers on every floor and train up some of the residents even.
Sure the fire spread quickly but I bet a lot of time was lost between the fridge catching fire and the alarm being raised plus the time to get the fire service to arrive.

you'd have to have someone stationed inside every apartment to monitor fires,
and even then mass evacuation down a single stairway if there's a fire

the outside can smoulder and suddenly take off in flames via the air gap

iguana

silverharp wrote: »

Sure the fire spread quickly but I bet a lot of time was lost between the fridge catching fire and the alarm being raised plus the time to get the fire service to arrive.

Afaik it was just minutes. The homeowner knew right away that his fridge was on fire. He called the fire-service and then tried to extinguish it himself. When he couldn't he alerted his nearby neighbours and within 6 minutes the first fire-fighters arrived and he and the nearest neighbours exited the building.

JustAThought

iguana wrote: »

Afaik it was just minutes. The homeowner knew right away that his fridge was on fire. He called the fire-service and then tried to extinguish it himself. When he couldn't he alerted his nearby neighbours and within 6 minutes the first fire-fighters arrived and he and the nearest neighbours exited the building.

Perhaps another scandal to address is why, like with the cladding that is banned from tower blocks over a certain height in the US, are fridge freezers with plastic clad backs not banned in Tower blocks -apparently they also are in the US- pertinent given that the UK firebrigade regard them as the most dangerous appliance in use in a home. A faulty design on a Hotpoint/Whirlpool faulty appliance has already caused one serious tower block fire in Shepherds Bush a few years back -even then they failed to decide whether they would issue a total ban on using them - and here we are again. It's all about the claims and insurance. The pity is ,like Ireland, the legislators and those responsible for policy and enforcement of safe standards and practices seem to be permanently asleep at the wheel.

There are still blocks of apartments in areas in Dublin that even I know of built from wood frames and without proper firewalls. Everyone knows of them since the last fire where scores of appartments hsd to be evicted and yet nothing has been done to fix the remainder of them nor to punish the builders. And that building regulator in the council and the council inspector still have their jobs, and no doubt will after the next fire too. Grenfell and Chelsea borough are not the only firetraps we should be worried about.

Samaris

tara73 wrote: »

and what would that bring? if you look at Grenfell Tower, the flames spread so quickly to the upper floors, litterally in seconds. If you put firefighters and their relevant equipment on every affectetd Tower, it might work, but just a person to monitor? Don't think so.

mikeybrennan wrote: »

you'd have to have someone stationed inside every apartment to monitor fires,
and even then mass evacuation down a single stairway if there's a fire

the outside can smoulder and suddenly take off in flames via the air gap

Maybe not - a nightwatchman patrolling the building would probably be a good temporary measure while the blocks are being assessed. This particular council was able to reaccommadate the people affected, but that doesn't mean that other councils will be able to, certainly not if all the councils are trying to do it at once.

A nightwatchman isn't a perfect solution, it's not going to -stop- a fire of this sort, but at least he could see a fire, ring the fire brigade and start an orderly evacuation before the panic starts, probably floor by floor. Or at the least a resident could contact him soon as they've run the fire brigade and he can go from there. It also slightly neutralises the danger of the fire starting, as it did in Grenfell, at night.

Not a permanent solution - the cladding needs to go, especially if the damned stuff, as well as being flammable as all get out, also has the nice side-effect of releasing hydrogen cyanide and killing people for heaven's sake. Even if it hadn't gone up like it did, the prussic acid fumes could easily have killed a number of those closest to the outbreak. Still, a patroller can't hurt.

mikeybrennan

I did say it a few days ago that evacuation was the logical next step

It comes down to the fact that any temporary measures can't guarantee tenant safety, according to fire safety inspectors.

Samaris

mikeybrennan wrote: »

I did say it a few days ago that evacuation was the logical next step

It comes down to the fact that any temporary measures can't guarantee tenant safety, according to fire safety inspectors.

Unfortunately, it IS the logical net step. I just don't know how physically possible it will be. The calculations I did quickly based on estimated population per tower multipled by the lowball (-very- lowball) number of towers affected came out at the population of a small town, and the number of affected towers has gone up nearly seven-fold just in England itself. It's one thing in places like the richest borough in England to re-settle multiple blocks of people (six blocks, I think?), but in poorer boroughs with limited housing, it can't be whistled out of the air. Even claiming social housing put aside (as for Grenfell) has a major knock-on effect on all the people waiting on the social housing lists. Basically, tens (or even hundreds) of thousands of council housing units are needed at once just to make up for that being taken out of circulation in the condemned towers. And it all needs to be within certain areas of the affected blocks to not completely uproot peoples lives moving them to other boroughs (with resultant loss of jobs, livelihoods, family support and community).

As a side-observation, a similar thing to this proposal happened in the East End of London in the 1950s, when entire communities of condemned social housing were torn down, mostly blocks, and the tightly-knit East End populations were sent to other housing, often in other areas. It completely broke the East End communities, although the tower blocks at the time were awful to live in, many had no running water and holes in the roofs. But it was a mixed blessing for the people, being removed from their family support groups and sent alone to new areas, especially with the collapse at the same time of the docklands industry that kept everyone employed. Obviously this is better than another Grenfell, mind you. But this is all going to be a rough time for those living in these towers.

It's a hell of a problem to solve. But peoples lives are on the line.

tara73

JustAThought wrote: »

Perhaps another scandal to address is why, like with the cladding that is banned from tower blocks over a certain height in the US, are fridge freezers with plastic clad backs not banned in Tower blocks -apparently they also are in the US- pertinent given that the UK firebrigade regard them as the most dangerous appliance in use in a home.

you can't dictate people what to buy or not to by if it's not banned altogether. you can't tell people living in Tower Blocks not to buy one specific item. I mean, theoretically you can, but then? Should the police control every day every Tower flats who might have bought this fridge..?:pac:

if it's the case that this fridge is already banned in the US because of faultyness, it should be banned everywhere, taken from the market.

I get the feeling, this Tower blocks are just a disaster waiting to happen every minute, it's a miracle there did'nt happen more.
At this point I actually think it would be best to demolish them and build new, safe buidlings. I don't think it's possible to get the Tower Blocks up to scratch fire safety wise, mainly because there's only one staircase and I don't think the stay put rule is adequate anymore. It might work if they build a second fire escape staircase, a safety staircase, but not sure.

mikeybrennan

I think staying put is the best system if you're sure of containment ​of the fire.

There seems to be problems with fire doors and services entering flats internally.

I'm still puzzled about the issues with the new gas installation.I thought the industry was strictly controlled.

Samaris

tara73 wrote: »

if it's the case that this fridge is already banned in the US because of faultyness, it should be banned everywhere, taken from the market.

If even the United States bans something for safety, we should probably look into it too! Although I remember when I lived in student accommadation, both in Ireland and in England, those little fridges or freezers were outright banned in the residences. Didn't understand why at the time, but if they're that inclined to go up in smoke, I get it now!

tara73

mikeybrennan wrote: »

I think staying put is the best system if you're sure of containment ​of the fire.

I don't think so. When can you be 100% sure? This disaster is the best example you can never be 100% sure.
Obviously, you can never know which lunatic alteration/refurbishments have been made in older buildings which make the stay put rule null and void/fatal.

Send In The Robots

mikeybrennan wrote: »

I think staying put is the best system if you're sure of containment ​of the fire.

Depends, as a last resort if located above 40 meters or so, and in imminent danger then there are specalised 'tower parachutes' available, which deploy in 0.5secs.

Probably only practical in very high rise buildings, and after all other possible options are exhausted in such an event.

One problem would be sureness of containment, without direct communications this would be hard to assess.

If beside a similar neighbouring high rise, zip wire transfer could be a solution, could be tricky to impliement.

mikeybrennan

The fire service obviously can make a decision to evacuate if necessary when they arrive

That is currently the only option in the tower blocks with 1 stairwell and no fire alarm system

Junkyard Tom

Not so much 'health and safety gone mad' as 'health and safety gone'.

Water John

Not being flippant in any way, but the test standard has not been published.
There may be different levels of failure. Chilcott seems to be high risk.
If they contain PE, then that is serious and must come down ASAP.

mikeybrennan

I'm sure there's plenty of problems behind the cladding too.

if they were using cheaper cladding I'll bet they were cutting back on intumescent fire stops too

Peregrinus

tara73 wrote: »

I don't think so. When can you be 100% sure? This disaster is the best example you can never be 100% sure.
Obviously, you can never know which lunatic alteration/refurbishments have been made in older buildings which make the stay put rule null and void/fatal.

But, equally, you can't know that staying put is more dangerous than leaving. Reportedly, in the Grenfell Tower disaster, a significant portion of the dead were recovered from corridors and stairwells, so clearly leaving doesn't guarantee safety. In fact we know that mass evacuation of high-rise buildings is extremely problematic and needs expert management; if everybody simply leaves as soon as they realise there's a problem, that's a recipe for congestion, blockages, injuries, deaths. People have to leave early enough, obviously, but they also have to leave at staggered intervals so that the flow through the exit routes is controlled and speed of exit is maximised.

In other words, you need experienced fire wardens on hand, which is not going to happen in a residential block with a fire at 2 a.m.

So, probably designing and building such blocks so that fires can be realiably contained and mass evacuation should not be necessary is going to be the optimal way to assure people's safety. And I think the big failing in this case was the design/build of the block. You may need to plan for evacuation as a fallback, but it's going to be a poor fallback, with a high associated risk of injuries and deaths.

Samaris

Whatever happened to outside fire escapes, the metal stairs? Okay, this might not have been incredibly helpful in, say, the Grenfell blaze, given the circumstances, but you used to see them all over highrises in films from ...what, the 1980s, 1990s? Is it just my imagination or do they not happen as much now?

Peregrinus

Those were American films, Samaris.

The US - and particularly cities like New York, Chicago, etc - had high-rise buildings long before they were common in Europe. After a number of terrible fires (e.g. the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire of 1911) tougher building codes required the retrofitting to existing buildings of additional fire escapes. The only way this could be done was with external steps, so these became common.

However they weren't very satisfactory. They were a security risk. They tended to be treated by residents as balconies, with furniture, pot plants, drying washing, etc, all of which got in the way of their primary use. And when people started retrofitting air-conditioners to buildings as well, air conditioning plant blocked, or reduced the size of, the windows that give access to the fire escape, and often partially blocked the fire escape as well. The fire escapes themselves corroded over time and would collapse if subject to excessive weight (such as everyone trying to evacuate in the event of a fire), so they had to be periodically repaired or replaced - an expensive proposition, and more expensive as the building gets taller.

Finally, you have the problem of vertigo. A lot of the late nineteenth/early twentieth century buildings to which these escapes were fitted were six, eight, ten stories tall, surrounded by (and often terraced with) similar buildings. Using such an escape on free-standing 24-story building would be a whole different matter, All you need is one person to freeze, and you have the makings of a blocked escape route.

I think it's a long time since US building codes have permitted the erection of a new building that relies on an external fire escape, so as older buildings are replaced external fire escapes are slowly disappearing.

Samaris

Ah, fair enough. Yeah, my memories of them were a bit fuzzy and 1980s American movies-ish. And yeah, the problems are all pretty serious ones.

I don't know how calm I'd be being outside of a burning building 24 stories up on a gently rocking (and very hot) metal skeleton either!

swampgas

There is a good article on the history of fire escapes in the US on 99% invisible.
Having trouble posting links atm but just Google for "99% invisible good egress".

Samaris

swampgas wrote: »

There is a good article on the history of fire escapes in the US on 99% invisible.
Having trouble posting links atm but just Google for "99% invisible good egress".

Thanks, found it. Although I was wondering for a moment if I might get an article about a large, invisible ostrich-like bird

http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/good-egress/