The following is playing devil's advocate - It's almost easy to justify not sprinklering something. It really starts with the goals and assumptions. Start with able bodied people awake and the only goal is survival, sprinklers become a cost and not a strategy that make gains over fire alarms. Now I know the assumptions and goals above are not necessarily realistic. Type of construction also becomes less important with above assumptions and goals especially with one story buildings with a lot of doors. I said less important not unimportant (i.e. The Station Fire, sheetrock changes that outcome all else being the same right?)
Remember the probability of any one building having a significant fire is very, very small. That's why we have troubles gaining ground in the industry. People do a cost-risk analysis and don't come up with a justification. Although there really isn't much left to sprinkler so considerable ground has been made over the long haul. Really it comes down to the number of fires has fallen in all occupancies; lives lost about match the reduction of fires. One could argue all fire protection including sprinklers, alarm, fire walls and material science has made little difference. It is we have less fire to start with. Credit for this could be argued is the lawyers who sued manufactures and organizations like UL and CPSC. Yes there is the argument sprinklers and alarms detect fires that would have otherwise grown but are not reported. There is no real way to sort this out. I suspect all factors played a role and anyone of them is not the answer. In early college schooling it was reported every person had first hand experience with a family member having a fire. This was late 1980's and probably data from the early '70's (note I don't know which century). For example a kid remembers an Uncle's house burned or even the apartment down the hall had a fire. Today I don't think that's true. I don't know of a fire anyplace in my living extended family on either my side or my wife's. Every day just about we all see or hear of a car accident. You see repair garages with banged up cars out front as your drive to work, just about everybody has been in one, we are tied up in traffic until we get to the front of the line and see the remains of one and every 10 minutes or so the radio in your car gives you a traffic update during rush hour(s). It's pure marketing (if black) for protection schemes in cars. We don't see this with fire. We're in the fire business did you see one today? I did here of two today (one on this forum and one on the news because the slant was the -10 deg the FF had to work in, the fire was really secondary to the story). Imagine those who arent in the business. You can't miss the traffic but you can sure tune out the news to help the kids get their homework done if a fire was even reported. Compound lack of fire with about everyone has a story about a sprinkler system leaking. Yes many are my friend at work..... but the point is they don't say my friend at work had a fire.... It is our success as fire safety professionals that make justifying more sprinklers hard. The preceding was playing devil's advocate and are not to be confused with my real professional opinion everything should be sprinklered. Chris Cahill, P.E. Fire Protection Engineer Sentry Fire Protection, Inc. 763-658-4483 763-658-4921 fax Email: [email protected] Mail: P.O. Box 69 Waverly, MN 55390 Location: 4439 Hwy 12 SW Waverly, MN 55390 -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of å... .... Sent: Wednesday, December 31, 2008 12:27 PM To: [email protected] Subject: another fire - this will be interesting Interesting story - I have recently had 'discussions' with a consultant who has undertaken a 'fire engineering study' for an education dept in England which concluded that sprinklers were not needed in a new school (despite a presumption issued by the Government Department responsible for schools which states that all new schools should be sprinklered). ******************* Does not the demand for sprinkler depend on what the need for the sprinklers are? Most forum members want a fire reduced society, and full employment. But is it really cost effective to require sprinklers in all occupancies? For instance, in Type I and Type II schools? It depends on what the need is. Is the need to maintain life safety and egress of occupants in a Type I or II school? If that is the need, then sprinklers need not be part of the plan, probably. Is the need for sprinklers to help justify man-down policies at fire departments? Touchy, but one that needs to be faced front forward. Is the need for sprinklers to prevent business interruption? An arguably justifiable need. But to just say, they need sprinklers, is selfish of our industry, without us stating what the sprinklers provide. In a few cases, not much, or more importantly, not what is needed. Frankly, I believe if we simply put sprinklers and a slightly more-than-prescribed number of exits in the design, we would not need me, FPE's expertise or their fees on 85% of our building inventory. That is not being greedy or dumb or lazy, that is being good to society and efficient at cutting excess fat out of the job... something every worker should try to do. scot deal excelsior fire engineering _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [email protected] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[email protected] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [email protected] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[email protected] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field)
