As a follow-up to the recent thread on water mist systems, there’s a good article on its application in the NFPA Journal. It was used to protect the attic of the Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in New York. It’s a 33,000 sf concealed combustible space over 100 ft above the ground. The NYFD had been pushing for years for a sprinkler system but due to the historical value of the plaster ceiling beneath the attic, the fear of water bringing the ceiling down stopped the effort to require sprinklers. Looks like we finally found a group that can tell the AHJ no thank you. The cost was around $1.1 million (estimated to be about $350,000 more than traditional sprinklers).
One of the hurdles for water mist systems (besides the cost) is summed up by the following statement by the NYFD. “On paper it seems like it works, but no one knows exactly how it would react [in a fire],” he says. “We can look at tests, we can look at what Marioff has offered us as far as their testing and what they've done with it, but until we actually fight a fire where one of these systems is in use, it's hard to tell exactly what will happen with it.” Roland _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/listinfo.cgi/sprinklerforum-firesprinkler.org
