As we approach the fifth anniversary of the Grenfell Tower tragedy and three months since the separate fire tragedies in the United States in Philadelphia and New York, it is clear that structure fires continue to pose a challenge to residential occupancies around the globe. While some may argue that innovations and advancement in new technologies are the solution to narrow the gap in fire safety in our communities, the real need is to return to the basics of fire protection and life safety: fire alarm and detection, compartmentation, and suppression. Construction incorporating all three of these components provides redundant fire-safety measures in the event of failure of one of these components.
The fire in a three-storey multifamily residential building in Philadelphia in the early morning of 5 January 2022, which resulted in 12 fatalities including nine children, is a case study in the importance of active fire detection and alarm systems. While six smoke alarms were installed in the apartment where the fire originated, none of them were operational. Five of the detection devices had their batteries removed by residents, and one detection device had been destroyed, likely due to occupants weary of continued nuisance alarms. Nuisance alarms, while easily remedied through the proper selection and placement of detection devices, continue to be a challenge for fire safety in the Gulf region. A fire-alarm signal which is ignored is just as good as not having any fire-alarm signal at all, since it will have little effect in initiating evacuation of occupants in a fire or other emergency. Had the smoke alarms in the Philadelphia apartment building been operational and fit for purpose, it is likely the 12 fatalities that resulted from the fire would have been avoided.
While the Philadelphia fire demonstrated the critical importance of detection and notification, fire in a 19-storey apartment building in the Bronx borough of New York City showed the value of compartmentation in containing smoke from fire. The fire on 9 January 2022 occurred just four days after the Philadelphia fire and was equally if not more tragic with 17 fatalities, including eight children. While the fire was confined to one apartment unit on the third floor, the fatalities were due to smoke spreading throughout the building after the doors to the apartment unit were left open. This incident poses important questions to us in the Gulf region: are we aware of the important role of self-closing apartment doors in the compartment strategy of our buildings? How diligent are we in ensuring the integrity of our fire-resistance-rated walls and partitions? Are building owners and facilities managers providing through-penetration firestop systems for penetrations through fire-resistance-rated walls and partitions?
The common thread in the Philadelphia apartment building, the Bronx apartment building and Grenfell Tower was that all three structures were not protected throughout by automatic sprinklers. When properly installed and maintained, automatic sprinklers save lives by limiting fire size and smoke development and controlling their spread beyond the area of origin. The fire in Grenfell Tower involving fuel from cladding external to the building was similar to the Address Hotel fire in Dubai in 2016; however, automatic sprinklers and a well-implemented emergency management plan resulted in the Address Hotel fire having no fatalities. Conversely, Grenfell Tower relied solely on passive fire protection in its fire strategy.
Many high-rise structures designed across the globe before and during the 1970s were constructed without automatic sprinklers, as local building regulations at the time of design and construction did not require them. Few cities have required retrofit of automatic sprinkler systems in these high-rise buildings. The City of Chicago’s Life Safety and High Rise Sprinkler Ordinances passed in 2003, however, were designed to provide additional fire and life safety measures in high-rise buildings designed and constructed prior to 1975. Automatic sprinklers are required to be installed for these buildings over a phased period of 12 years, in addition to one-way and two-way voice communication systems. These emergency voice alarm communications systems allow Civil Defense personnel to communicate with building occupants in the case of an emergency and for emergency response teams to communicate with a central incident command. The Chicago ordinances are a model for fire alarm and sprinkler retrofit in cities such as New York and London, as well as cities in the Gulf region where such ordinances do not exist.
Combining active fire-protection systems with passive fire-protection systems to implement a balanced fire-protection design provides the highest level of protection, and should be the standard for all residential structures, including existing multifamily residential buildings. It is well beyond time to consider retrofit ordinances for active fire-protection and life-safety systems. When designed, installed and maintained properly, these active systems will work together with buildings’ passive fire protection to protect the life safety of occupants and avoid future tragedies.
About the Author
Vice President, fire codes and standards at the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association.
