MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
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with the government paying the bill,
She refused to be nailed down on whether councils would get extra money for this funding
she was also very weasely about whether the lakanal house coroners report recommended that sprinklers should be installed in all blocks
MrOvershoot - Member
maxtorque - Member
Flour mills (and similar industries) have the issue of "dust explosions" and sprinklers combat that risk (by washing the fine dust out the atmosphere) so i'm not surprised they must be fitted.
I guess I'm the other person who is still in the flour milling game? And as he said they are great for internal fires.
Large fire at a mil today in Crewe, 6 fire engines and 3 floors involved
http://www.cheshirefire.gov.uk/news-events/incidents/ongoing-large-industrial-fire-in-crewe
Latest Clickbait on FB relating to this headlines with "survivors to be house somewhere "up north" or face losing benefits for becoming voluntarily homeless" . . . .
wwaswas - Member
Downing Street have just announced that there are at least 600 hi-rise buildings in the UK with the same cladding on them.Jeez.
aye was just reading that.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40366646
aye was just reading that.
apparently that was a mistake by No.10 press office that May repeated
they meant 600 tower blocks with cladding of some kind
only 3 so far have been found to have the dodgy stuff, not sure how many have been tested
But for a brief moment I bet that a lot of tower block residents that saw the 600 figure were even more worried!
cheers.
its still up on the News webpages though, BBC, telegrapgh- has a particularly alarming front page!
just when you thought the gov might be getting their act together on this, they are now spreading fake news!
Yep - very very irresponsible to release this incorrect info.
600 sounded like every clad high-rise in the country!
From that BBC link:
Councils were told to give details to the government about the cladding they used in the tower blocks by Monday.The Department for Communities and Local Government is then co-ordinating tests on it - [u]with up to 100 able to take place in a day.[/u]
100 a day sounds like they are only doing some kind of 'quick and dirty' testing, maybe just a small scale surface spread of flame test.
For those tower blocks with the same type of combustible cladding as Grenfell Tower, of which some have already been identified in Camden and Tottenham according to the BBC article, the local authority is going to need to undertake an immediate revised Fire Risk Assessment. I find it difficult to imagine how a new assessment will be able to conclude other than that the fire safety of the flats is not acceptable. Given that it will take months to remove/replace the cladding, that will necessitate immediate rehousing of the tenants, so again we could be looking at people being put up in hotels for months. They might be able to say that only tenants in floors above 18m need be evacuated, since that is the maximum height up to which this cladding would be permitted by Building Regs, but I cannot imagine tenants on the remaining floors being happy to accept that.
A stop-gap might be too see if the blocks have rooftop water tanks that are big enough to be used for a curtain type deluge system down the outside of the block, but I suspect any retrofit/upgrade to do that will be prohibitively expensive compared to rehoming the occupants and refitting the cladding.
Could you not rehouns the tenants until the cladding has been removed only, as once it's gone the fire risk is removed, unless the removal of it will open up their homes to the elements, in which case, it was never really just 'cladding' was it?
A stop-gap might be too see if the blocks have rooftop water tanks that are big enough to be used for a curtain type deluge system down the outside of the block, but I suspect any retrofit/upgrade to do that will be prohibitively expensive compared to rehoming the occupants and refitting the cladding.
There are two problems with external drenchers:
1. The amounts of water they require are huge. A sprinkler system inside flats will only need a small tank and a small pump because it will be designed to control a fire contained within only a few rooms at most involving a relatively small quantity of combustible material with only a few sprinkler heads operating. A drencher system needs to deliver something like 10mm/min of water to every square metre of wall protected. That's 10 litres [i]every[/i] minute for [i]every[/i] square metre, and since you can't expect the drenchers to extinguish the fire, only to control it and limit its spread, you need a water supply that will provide that for a significant duration. Even if such a system were installed with zones to limit which drencher heads released water, it would still be impractical and cost prohibitive.
2. Drenchers will not control a fire if it is occurring inside panels, like the ACM panels. It might have an effect when the outer sheet delaminates and allows water to reach the burning polyethylene, and similarly when the inner sheet comes away that will allow water to reach the PIR boards behind (if they were contributing to the fire significantly given that they were fire resistant), but another possible problem is that the polyethylene reportedly drips burning droplets when alight, so falling sheets and molten droplets might fall onto the drencher heads (you would need them part way up the building, not just at the roof) and interfere with their ability to spray water.
Could you not rehouns the tenants until the cladding has been removed only, as once it's gone the fire risk is removed
On the face of it, I think that is what they are likely to have to do.
Even if such a system were installed with zones to limit which drencher heads released water, it would still be impractical and cost prohibitive.
That's what I was thinking, I'm in the process safety side, we use them on oil tanks, but they're a touch smaller.
They may keep the residents in the building but change the protocol in the event of a fire from 'stay put' to 'immediate egress' if the stairwells have been sized correctly to handle the footfall.
I'm in the process safety side, we use them on oil tanks
Sounds like interesting work.
They may keep the residents in the building but change the protocol in the event of a fire from 'stay put' to 'immediate egress' if the stairwells have been sized correctly to handle the footfall.
The problem with that is if the flats are like Grenfell Tower with only a single exit route. If the Fire Risk Assessment concludes that 'stay put' is not viable, then two exit routes (stairwells) are needed, since you have to consider the possibilities that:
- fire starts in the stairwell (e.g. contractors leave materials there or someone discards an old sofa in the stairwell), or
- fire starts in a flat but spreads and breaks through fire resisting doors into the stairwell, or
- the stairwell becomes smoke logged from a fire.
The letter the failed governmnent has sent out to landlords and property managers
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40375200
just where are all the skilled workers and trained staff going to come from to do this, and where are all the residents going to be rehomed/live, some old and infirm some with kids and some who just want move out, then theres pets, internet access, food and drink,postal services and lots more to sort out.
Maybe for tower blocks that have these types of cladding they update the stay put policy to include marginally or not opening the windows and maybe putting wet towels behind doors where smoke is coming in.
I am assuming with Greenfell due to hot weather, most had the windows open, which when the cladding did or didn't do something, these open windows let the fire in meaning the stay put policy didn't work.
Even if such a system were installed with zones to limit which drencher heads released water, it would still be impractical and cost prohibitive.
That's what I was thinking,I'm in the process safety side, we use them on oil tanks, but they're a touch smaller.
Offshore platforms use deluge systems with sea water lift pumps giving them in theory an infinite supply of water, provided they can maintain power to the pumps in the event of a fire. Thing is though the systems get tested on a regular basis and have to meet performance standards. They also aren't without their problems such a leaks etc. So on a residential block of flats you'd need to have relevant standards in place and ensure you can deliver to the standard, plus you'd need to maintain the systems.
Where at all possible it is far more sensible, cheaper and reliable to not make (residential) buildings out of combustible material in the first place.
The letter the failed governmnent has sent out to landlords and property managers
What strikes me most is that the Government (despite all the expertise it has available to draft that letter and give guidance) is dumping all the responsibility on individual Fire Safety Officers and the Fire Risk Assessors, by failing to give them much clearer guidance and implying that somehow they may be able to conclude that residents can continue to stay in blocks with highly combustible cladding, and that only "In the case of the most serious risk, consideration must be given to moving all residents out of the block until satisfactory remedial work has been done".
Hopefully there are no more than a few blocks with cladding like that used on Grenfell Tower, but if I were the risk assessor or Fire Safety Officer responsible for them, there is no way I would sign off on the flats being occupied until the cladding was removed, not even if there is a sprinkler system, since it will not stop a cladding fire.
If that were not enough, the BBC is now reporting [url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40380584 ]here[/url] that not only as expected does the cladding used on Grenfell Tower fail fire safety tests, [u]but that the insulation used also failed[/u]. The insulation was a Celotex PIR product which had previously passed the necessary test to allow it to be used on high rise buildings, as detailed by Celotex on the front page of its own website [url= https://www.celotex.co.uk/ ]here[/url]. We don't know why it failed the latest tests, and it might be due to incorrect installation on Grenfell Tower rather than a fault in the product. I suspect that the Celotex product may have been used much more widely on high rise buildings in the UK than the combustible cladding. The only consolation is that PIR usually burns slowly and does not rapidly spread fire, so providing it has not been overclad with a highly combustible cladding like that used on Grenfell Tower, it should hopefully not present such a severe threat. Even so the Government should be giving clear guidance about this.
If that were not enough, the BBC is now reporting here that not only as expected does the cladding used on Grenfell Tower fail fire safety tests, but that the insulation used also failed. The insulation was a Celotex PIR product which had previously passed the necessary test to allow it to be used on high rise buildings, as detailed by Celotex on the front page of its own website here. We don't know why it failed the latest tests, and it might be due to incorrect installation on Grenfell Tower rather than a fault in the product. I suspect that the Celotex product may have been used much more widely on high rise buildings in the UK than the combustible cladding. The only consolation is that PIR usually burns slowly and does not rapidly spread fire, so providing it has not been overclad with a highly combustible cladding like that used on Grenfell Tower, it should hopefully not present such a severe threat. Even so the Government should be giving clear guidance about this.
The problem is that "burns slowly" still means more heat is being given of than is required to ignite it. So given a big enough heat source you can ignite the whole lot at once and then it turns into a lot of 'burning slowly'. Same as any chimney fire, the tar can't normally burn, but the flue effect adds enough heat and oxygen and it's soon out of control.
just where are all the skilled workers and trained staff going to come from to do this
I'm an out of work process safety engineer (waves at Sobriety).
TBH fire safety can be as much an art with opinions and guidelines as it is science. Because hopefully the assumptions never get tested. e.g. that 10mm/m3min for deluge, it probably worked on a setup at the H&S labs at Matlock, it doesn't guarantee that it will work in real life though, OTOH it may be over engineered with a huge margin in a particular application.
Offshore platforms use deluge systems with sea water lift pumps giving them in theory an infinite supply of water, provided they can maintain power to the pumps in the event of a fire. Thing is though the systems get tested on a regular basis and have to meet performance standards. They also aren't without their problems such a leaks etc. So on a residential block of flats you'd need to have relevant standards in place and ensure you can deliver to the standard, plus you'd need to maintain the systems.
Sprinkler systems for blocks of flats are covered by the same standards as for sprinkler systems generally. I don't know about offshore standards, but the standard for sprinkler systems on ships is a very slimmed down 'copy and paste' version of the onshore standard (for example it omits a lot of the detailed requirements for individual sprinkler components to meet relevant standards).
Where at all possible it is far more sensible, cheaper and reliable to not make (residential) buildings out of combustible material in the first place.
Totally agree. Installing sprinklers in tower blocks to provide an extra margin of safety over and above what should already be a safe building due to non-combustible contruction with good fire divisions is one thing. However, if they are to be installed to compensate for combustible construction etc. and are consequently absolutely critical for life safety, then they will cost a lot more, e.g. they will need two pumps (one a diesel in case of loss of electrical power) and two tanks instead of one.
Just seen this in the news
Labour put a warning shot across the government's bow when it calculated the potential lost revenue from AirPassenger Duty at £90m a year, but also the number of extra firefighters who could be hired (2,000 according to the Shadow Chancellor).
I wonder where these firefighters would be employed given that loads of stations up and down the country have been shut down due to cuts and we would have no where to put them.
In fact we haven't recruited in years for that very reason and lack of funds due to the cuts. As people left rather than fill the spot they just shut the station
Ridiculous statement given that we are still knocking stations down in our brigade, or perhaps they will rebuild the old ones they've knocked down lol
Watching the news now in Spain and they are saying hat the cladding "fails all safety tests".
What are these "extra" fire fighters going to actually do?
Large building fires in the UK are rare (thankfully) so hiring more firefighters specifically to tackle large building fires seems like a ridiculous thing to do to me!
(more fire fighters in general might be needed if it can be shown that under resource is impacting on performance, but that should be a station by station decision)
The fundamental reason we have less fire fighters is, i suspect, that we now have less fires due to primarily a lot less people smoking at home (which used to be the no1 cause of domestic fires)
[quote=maxtorque ]What are these "extra" fire fighters going to actually do?
Large building fires in the UK are rare (thankfully) so hiring more firefighters specifically to tackle large building fires seems like a ridiculous thing to do to me!
(more fire fighters in general might be needed if it can be shown that under resource is impacting on performance, but that should be a station by station decision)
The fundamental reason we have less fire fighters is, i suspect, that we now have less fires due to primarily a lot less people smoking at home (which used to be the no1 cause of domestic fires)
reason we have less fires are the huge prevention work done by FF fitting smoke alarms offering HFSV, we are so good at what we do we cut down our work and number of personnel required (turkeys voting for Christmas) oh and oven chips have helped can't remember the last chip pan fire I had.
Prevention is always better. Labours approach while headline catching is pretty much the wrong one, far better to spend the money on improving regs, building surveyors, education, research etc.
Also someone needs to re-look at evacuation of tower blocks. I remember Arup having done studies around 10 years ago where they determined that the fastest way to evacuate these building was via the lifts. However, that contradicts conventional recommendations.
The fire has been highlighted today as starting from a Hotpoint fridge freezer,and police are looking at all types of criminal charges.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-23738142
seems as if fire safety has been compromised for a while, but SOT council are doing better than most.
project - Member
The fire has been highlighted today as starting from a Hotpoint fridge freezer,and police are looking at all types of criminal charges.
Does that mean Hotpoint fridge freezer will now see a drop in sell? 😯
Its not like you to bash labour at every point and use any thread or topic to score cheap political pointsLabours approach while headline catching is pretty much the wrong one
They all contain the same refrigerant :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isobutane
600a - it is used to stop the whole planet burning up long term..
Its a tricky thing - there are millions of them out there and the odd one
is going to cause a fire, it is probably more likely that one of the tumble drier fires or a Zafira parked near the building would do it again.
This vid came up on my youtube feed. Its about Kensington council sending £100 to each (higher rate?) council tax payer in the borough in 2014, with a letter saying how well they'd done saving money that year...
Also someone needs to re-look at evacuation of tower blocks. I remember Arup having done studies around 10 years ago where they determined that the fastest way to evacuate these building was via the lifts. However, that contradicts conventional recommendations.
I'm not familiar with those studies, but I would be very wary of accepting them at face value without independent research. Arup has a vested interest in designing very high buildings, and I suspect that being able to rely on lifts for evacuation allows it to build higher and accommodate more people than if they are required to provide sufficient fire exit stairwells and compartmentation to allow people to evacuate safely under their own steam.
Whether it's a study or a risk assessment, a classic mistake is to have decided what the preferred outcome should be in advance, which then 'influences' the process, potentially fatally, to deliver the desired result.
For example, I once reviewed a fire engineering case prepared by a company which is a leader in the field. It contained an Event Tree Analysis to justify extending travel distances in a hospital corridor. Superficially it was impressive, but the engineer had made a fundamental logical error in the Event Tree, which meant it was wrong. At the end of the day, I did not worry about it because the travel distance was only being stretched slightly from something like 25m to 29m, and the extra few metres should not be a matter of life and death given all the other fire safety precautions in place, but it was an example of how fire safety engineering was used incorrectly to deliver the pre-determined desired result. It was also something that should have been picked up by the Fire Safety Officer who reviewed the plans etc. for Building Control, and I suspect that Fire and Rescue Authorities need more resources to fund more Fire Safety Officers (and more training for them) to enable them to properly undertake their enforcement role, i.e. reviewing designs for new builds and inspecting both buildings under construction and existing buildings.
[url= http://news.sky.com/story/camden-evacuates-tower-block-after-grenfell-fire-10925449 ]http://news.sky.com/story/camden-evacuates-tower-block-after-grenfell-fire-10925449[/url]