European Fire Sprinkler Network

In 2007-2009 the Building Research Establishment carried out a research programme on car park fires, paid by the British government. The programme included a literature review; a review of statistics; computer modelling of actual fires and test fires; and full-scale fire tests. Some of the fire tests were run a second time with sprinklers.

The 112-page report is available for download at

http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/planningandbuilding/pdf/1795610.pdf

The researchers modelled a fire which occurred in a car park in Bristol and spread to all 22 cars. It is not shown in the report but in a presentation given in January 2010, which can be purchased from BRE in a package with videos of the fire tests, the modellers predicted a peak heat release rate of almost 60 MW. This compares with an assumed figure of 8MW in the British Standard for smoke control.

The researchers found that a car park fire can spread from one car to another, even across an empty parking space, to involve a large number of cars. There are many examples of large car park fires, most recently in Haarlem in The Netherlands.

Temperatures exceeded 1100C in the unsprinklered car fire tests and the fire spread readily from the first car to other cars, with the heat release rate reaching 2MW at 7 minutes and peaking at 16MW for the three cars in the test after 20 minutes.

When a test was run with sprinklers the fire did not spread beyond the first car. In addition for over 40 minutes the heat release rate was held to less than 0.3MW and temperatures to less than 100C. However, the sprinklered fire was not extinguished and briefly grew to 7MW and 800C at 55 minutes before dying down again.

These results allowed the researchers to conclude that a sprinkler system will prevent fire spread from one car to another, and that it will prevent damage to the structure. Many fire-fighters have commented that with a sprinkler system it is possible for them to enter an enclosed car park in reasonable safety to approach the fire and complete extinguishment.

Der Spiegel reports that a fire in a home for the elderly in Nuremberg in Germany has killed an elderly woman and injured four others. The fire started in the evening on 13th December and was caused by a power socket extension. 80 fire-fighters in 30 vehicles attended and evacuated 20 residents. The damage was estimated at €100,000.

On 6th December a fire in a home for the elderly in Wurzburg killed three residents. More than 100 residents were evacuated by the fire brigade. According to the Wurzburg Fire Brigade Chief, Franz-Josef Hench, the fire alarm operated and the fire doors closed. There were also regular evacuation drills performed with the fire brigade.

Neither home was fitted with a sprinkler system. Eugen Brysch, the chairman of the German Hospice Trust, said that there should be sprinklers and smoke detectors in the rooms.

Against these tragedies, the local press in Kiel reports that a fire in a clothing shop in the LEIK shopping centre on 8th December was extinguished by the sprinkler system. The fire alarm operated at 05:00 but the fire was out when the fire brigade arrived. Damage was very limited and the shopping centre opened as normal.

Today in Cardiff the Welsh Assembly in a plenary session approved the general principles of proposed legislation to require sprinklers in all new Welsh housing.

Assembly Member Ann Jones, who put forward the proposal, has been giving television interviews all day. At 12:30 she gave a press conference, joined by Caroline Tucker, who suffered 75% burns as she failed, when 11 years old, to save her 4 year old sister from a fire in their home in Swansea, Wales. Ann, Caroline and her mother were supported by the presence of about 40 uniformed Fire Chiefs and Officers, who came from all over the United Kingdom.

It was such a powerful message than when Ann's proposal came up for discussion in the afternoon plenary session there were no comments, no objections and the proposal was passed without the need for a vote. This is not the end of the process, amendments can and will be tabled. However, it is now very likely that the legislation will become law sometime next year. If you would like to follow the process, see this link.

http://www.assemblywales.org/bus-home/bus-legislation/bus-leg-measures/business-legislation-measures-domfiresafety.htm

On Sunday, 14th November, a fire started at about 01:30 in a high-rise hostel housing immigrant families in Dijon. According to reports the fire spread up the outside of the building, entering at several levels and filling the corridors and escape stairs with smoke. Seven people died and over 60 more were hospitalised, of whom about 10 were seriously injured. Five days later over 50 people are still in hospital. Two young men have been arrested.

The fire is believed to have been started deliberately in rubbish containers outside the building and to have spread up the outside of it, aggravated by the wind and by the insulation used in the building. The ten-storey building was not sprinklered. While sprinklers would not have prevented the external fire they could have prevented fire from getting inside the building. Sprinklers could also have been used to control the original rubbish container fire.

Three years after the fire in a furniture store in Charleston which killed 9 firefighters, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a US government laboratory, has published a report of what it believes happened. The report is a draft for public comment.

The building was not fitted with sprinklers. Using computer modelling, NIST found that "the addition of automatic sprinklers inside the loading dock could have significantly slowed the fire (which began just outside the dock area), prevented it from spreading beyond the dock, and eventually, extinguished it completely. The model also showed that sprinklers on the loading dock area likely would have maintained what firefighters call tenability conditions, the ability for individuals in a fire event to escape unassisted".

NIST is calling for sprinklers to be required in all new commercial retail furniture stores regardless of size, and in existing retail furniture stores with any single display area greater than 190m2 (2,000 ft2).

See http://www.nist.gov/el/fire_research/charleston_102810.cfm to download the two volumes of the report.

On 2nd November 2007, a few months after the Charleston fire, four firefighters were killed in a warehouse fire in the UK. As yet a similar, independent study has not been performed and so no building fire safety recommendations have been made to prevent a repeat of such a tragedy in the UK.

Gösta Holmstedt of Sprinklerfrämjandet, the Swedish sprinkler association, reports that the sprinkler system saved the Södra Timber sawmill in Långasjö. Fire broke out at about 09:00 on 23rd September. The cause is assumed to be sparks from a motor which ignited sawdust near a sawing machine. The entire site is sprinklered and one sprinkler extinguished the fire before fire-fighters arrived. This is a large sawmill which processes about 250,000m3 of wood per year.

A fire in a centre for people with dementia in Gislaved, southern Sweden, was also extinguished by a single sprinkler. The fire began in a store room and is believed to have been caused by spontaneous combustion of some rags soaked in linseed oil. This success is in sharp contrast to a fire which destroyed the Culloden Court Care Home in Inverness on 18th October. Only the walls remained of the 8 year-old home. The fire began at 17:30 and all 59 residents were led to safety. Had the fire started at night a major tragedy could have occurred.

Local media reports that on 28th October at 19:12 the fire alarm was raised at Hooty's Supplies, a discount store in Willenhall, near Birmingham. The fire began in a storage area but the sprinkler system prevented it from spreading while fire-fighters completed extinguishment. About 120 people were in the store at the time but all were safely evacuated.