United Kingdom Building Fires Report

Forewords

Fire is one of the catastrophes that pose one of the greatest risks not only to peoples’ lives but also to property and business premises¹. The fire risk index is also to a great extent compounded by the fact that the fire-causing risk factors are many, diverse, and complicated making the degree of fire risks vulnerability very high². Such causing factors of fire especially in buildings include terrorist attacks, bombs explosion, earthquakes and other natural catastrophes, electricity faults, as well as natural fire accidents in the dwelling units and all of which makes buildings and premises particularly vulnerable³. As a matter of fact, fire in buildings can be accidental or deliberately caused by enemies or terrorists. Irrespective of whether the fire in the building is accidental or deliberate, its immediate repercussions and the aftermath are equal in intensity ranging from deaths out of burns and chocking by smoke, non-fatal injuries as a result of the same and extensive to the total destruction of property either by the fire itself or by the rescue operations at times⁴.

All over the world, cases of fatal fire incidents in buildings, resulting from one of the multi-diverse causes have been reported. For instance, the fire that resulted from the terrorist attack on the world trading center in New York; the United States of America on September 11, 2001, is reported to have had many fatal and non – fatal casualties and extensive devastation of property. This paper, therefore, analyzes the issue of fires in a building while using detailed examples of large – and medium-scale fire and explosion disasters across Europe with a bias to the United Kingdom. In addition, the paper discusses safety engineering issues in relation to fire disasters in the built environment regarding the case studies that form the basis of analysis and give recommendations for improvement and prevention of such disasters for the future.

Fire accident statistics in the United Kingdom

According to a report presented by United Kingdom fire services, 2004 as presented to the office of the prime minister⁵, it was reported that in 2004 alone, the local authority fire and rescue services had virtually reacted to and attended to approximately 0.9 million fires and false alarm incident across the United Kingdom (basically England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland). Irrespective of the fact that this was 18% fewer such cases relative to the previous year (2003) the number of fire incidences were termed as high and a clear indication that the fire incidence ware still widespread irrespective of the countering measures that the local authority fire and rescue service departments had instituted. However, most (in fact three quarters) of the fires cases that the fire and rescue services authority had attended to were outdoor fires with the rest of the cases constituting fire in buildings and dwelling places⁶. According to the report, the number of deaths as a result of fire incidence across the United Kingdom was reported to be five hundred and eight in 2004 representing a slight reduction in the number of such cases in the previous year which were reported to be 593. The report also revealed that most of the fire incidents reported fatalities occurred in buildings and in people living places with the highest number being the aged and elderly (eight years of age and over), particularly in Wales and Scotland. At the same time, the non-fatal casualties of fire-related incidences in the United Kingdom in 2004 were equally high hitting the highs of 14600 in 2004 alone including 398 cases of firefighter casualties as well.

Fire disaster cases in the United Kingdom

England

King’s Cross fire – 1987

This is a flash fire that engulfed an old wooden escalator at the King’s Cross underground station on the eighteenth of November 1987 at 7.45 PM⁷. The incident culminated in thirty-one people losing their lives in that catastrophe together with a firefighter a Mr. Colin Townsley while on duty for the Soho Fire Station in central London. In the incident, the two other firefighters who were working with Mr. Colin Townsley and who had initially been trapped on the station’s platform specifically at the verge of the fire escalation miraculously survived. According to sources⁸, the fire was initially caused by a used and carelessly disposed of match stick by a reckless smoker irrespective of smoking in the London underground having been revoked following the oxford’s circus station fire a few years earlier. Sources, therefore, suspected that the match stick ignited oil and rubbish in a machine room underneath the escalator that used to serve the Picadilly Line.

The cause of the fire was exposed by London Fire Brigade investigators to have resulted from the most likely careless disposal of a lighted match by a lackadaisical smoker (smoker’s material), by a passenger on exit from the system.⁹.

Following the funnel’s investigations into the king crossfire incident, new fire precautions particularly in the stations were introduced as part of a measure to preventing such fires in the future. As a result, Fire Precautions (Sub-surface Railway Stations) Regulations 1989 were introduced the latter of which are habitually referred to as the Section 12 Regulations since they were initially enacted under section 12 of the 1971 Fire Precautions Act. Consequently, all wooden escalators on the Underground were replaced and the stations were prompted to install automatic sprinklers and heat detectors in escalators. In addition, the new safety precautions prompted that all the station staff be trained twice a year on fire safety and precautionary measure as well as to greatly improve their emergency services cooperation

Scotland

The Bradford City Stadium fire Tragedy

The Bradford City disaster is a horrific fire tragedy that occurred on Saturday, May 11, 1985, when a flash fire arose at the Valley Parade stadium in Bradford, in Scotland UK. According to sources, the fire incident ensued during the proceedings of a football match between Bradford City and Lincoln City in a third division cup final in brand ford. Sources reported that Branford city fans had degenerated into celebrations upon their win when one of them carelessly disposed of a lit match stick in a plastic cap and led to the inferno after it fell on the papers that had piled from below the stands for many years. Consequently, a huge fire arose from the stands and quickly escalated to the rest of the stadium making it impossible to contain it. Ideally, the nature of the material that had been used in the construction of the stadium led to a quick spread of the fire and hindered the efforts to control the inferno since wood and asbestos were the main material used in its construction. As a result, the stand was completely gutted down into flames resulting in 56 fatalities and well over 100 non-fatal casualties.

The result of the Popplewell Inquiry, the latter of which sought to find out the root of the inferno and make a recommendation on how such disaster could be prevented or mitigated in the future culminated in the establishment of new laws that aimed at enhancing safety in the sporting facilities across the United Kingdom and whose progress in achieving of these objects are rather impressive.

Northern Ireland

The Northern Ireland parliament fire: 1995

In January 1995 a fire, caused by an electrical fault, struck the Northern Ireland parliament burning it to ashes. In fact, this inferno goes down in the books of history as one of the most devastating building fire disasters to hit Northern Ireland since it completely razed the Northern Ireland chambers; the latter of which forms the most significant chambers in Northern Ireland political environment. Although no fatalities were reported as a result of the disaster, the complete destruction of chambers by the fire out of the electric fault opened the eyes of the northern Irish fire disasters management institutions as well as fire safety engineers in coming up with effective measures to prevent such disastrous events in the future. As a result, authorities and Northern Ireland related departments seized the tragedy as an opportunity to not only rebuilding the parliament chambers to their original magnificence but as an opportunity to upgrade it to an even better facility with fire safety precautions rooted in the deployment of safety engineering measures in the construction of the new chamber.

Wales

Peckham construction site fire (November 28, 2009)

The North West wale is one of the most recent places to be hit by a built environment fire disaster that put the lives of more than three hundred people in very great danger. The inferno that is reported to have ensured from a construction site in Peckham southeast of London in the wee hours of the morning on the 2nd of November 2009 and quickly spreads to the nearby residential flats threatening the lives of over three hundred residents and calling for the reflex actions of the fire emergency services to evacuate people from the infernal¹⁰. The early morning hour completely destroyed a fleet of mansionettes and a pub. Fortunately, there was no reported fatal casualty in excess of 10 people together with two policemen who were taken to hospital having suffered minor burns injuries, and chocks out of inhaling smoke. According to the local MP Harriet Herman, she described the evacuations of more than 300 residents as a miracle that no death was reported in the early morning inferno. The 310 people that were evacuated from the fire were temporarily accommodated as the firefighters jammed the fire site to help fight the fire and preventing its possible escalation and more devastation. After witnessing the inferno, the North West Wales emergency services provider spokesman said that the incident served as an eye-opener for the departments not only in Wales but in the whole of the United Kingdom to enhance their disaster preparedness, especially in relation to fire incidents. In addition, he indicated that safety engineering measures especially in construction were critical in order to either prevent or mitigate fire in building as the mode of construct, use of highly inflammable materials, and lack of fittings to promptly react to fire emergency to a greater extent increased the building’s vulnerability to devastating fire incidents.

Building safe from fires

Irrespective of the fact that it is near to impossible that the fire in building risks can be fully alleviated, a measure can be put in place to reduce the vulnerability or to effectively react and handle fire disasters, as well as reduce the fire devastating effect. This therefore can be achieved via what¹¹ refers to as creating a safer building in relation to fire risks management. As such, detailed fire risk assessment followed by initial mitigation of fire risk vulnerability via safety materials engineering coupled with beefed-up preparedness to handle fire incidents eventuality forms the fundamentals of building fire risks management of vulnerabilities.

Fire safety engineering

Fire safety engineering measures that buildings engineers and constructors put in place in an attempt to reduce the building fires risks and which ranges to use of anti-fire risk materials in the construction of building to the inclusion of the fire safety features in the architectural designs and fittings of the building¹². These included the use of non-combustible materials in construction such as glass, use of antimissile building materials, well-fitted fire alarms, emergency call lines in building to effectively and within the shortest time possible, fitting buildings with firefighting equipment, fire safety nets, the building of spacious and well-ventilated rooms, flexible and wide exit doors and alternative exit stairs to lifts among other measures.

Following the realization that fire risk indices are high and those fire incidents in building most of which were caused by occupants’ carelessness and reckless disposal of fire by smokers, authorities in many countries particularly the United Kingdom have reacted by enacting respective registrations to counter the fire risk factors. As such, registrations have been introduced that: –

1. Bans smoking in areas that are termed as highly vulnerable to a fire risk and: –
2. Entrench all aspects of fire safety engineering in relation to building construction materials and other fire safety measures i.e. fire fighting skills by the staff members and users requiring buildings to meet specified standards of fire risk safety and disaster preparedness. For example, the existing fire safety laws in the united kingdom directs that all those responsible for the prevention of fire in buildings and taking actions in events of fire incidents – including the owners, employers, and buildings occupiers-to continuously undertake fire risk evaluation and institute appropriate preventive measures to reduce fire in buildings risk. In addition, the statutes direct that such persons must have an appropriate fire management plan as a central constituent of the required fire safety management. In the UK fire safety in buildings, both residential and business premises are regulated by the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (‘the Order’)¹³.

In Scotland and wale, fire safety duties and responsibilities on the part of all responsible persons are contained in Part 3 of the Fire Scotland and Wale Act 2005, as amended, and the Fire Safety (Scotland) Regulations 2006.

Fire safety engineering recommendations

The paper recommends the following fire safety engineering measures to mitigate the fire risk in building in relation to fire safety.

• The constructors and builders should use certified anti-fire and antimissile materials in buildings constructions that go beyond compliance with the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (‘the Order’). And other such fire safety regulations are not only in the UK but all over the world to prevent both escalations of fire and movement of smoke the latter of which is equally hazardous to casualties.
• The governments and authorities should embark on training both the public users and staff in all the buildings about fire safety so as to equip them with adequate skills to effectively and efficiently react to fire incidents.
• All buildings should be spacious and be restrained from overcrowding and fitted with both wide exist doors and alternative emergency stairs so as to prevent cases of fire outbreaks and allow ease in escape in cases of fires eventualities.
• Strategic fire fighting departments especially in all the local authorities should be established and fitted with world-class equipment for effective reaction to fire incidents.

Conclusion

The various fire risk factors are responsible for high vulnerability to fire hazards both on the part of human life and property. The major concern on fire in buildings however is the danger that fire incidences pose to human life mainly the fatalities and non-fatal casualties. Example of historical fires in buildings across the United Kingdom includes the king crossfire of 1987 in England, the north highland parliament fire of 1995, Peckham construction site fire of 2009 in Wales and the Bradford City Stadium fire Tragedy of 1991 in Scotland. Ideally, Fire safety engineering forms and regulations governing fire safety measures in a building are the most ideal measures to guard buildings against fire risks and reacting effectively in cases where fire accidents arise and where such are inevitable.

Footnotes

1. Cecile Grant & Patrick J. (1986) Fire safety science: proceedings of the first international symposium: Hemisphere Publishing Cooperation.
2. Peter E. Hodgkinson & Michael Stewa (1991) Coping with catastrophe: a handbook of disaster management: Routledge.
3. Marcelo. M. Hirschler (1992) Fire hazard and fire risk assessment: American society for testing and materials special technical publication.
4. Peter E. Hodgkinson & Michael Stewa (1991) Coping With Catastrophe: A Handbook of Disaster Management: Routledge.
5. Office of the prime minister (2004) Fire statistics in the unite kingdom 2004. Web.
6. Office of the prime minister (2004) Fire statistics in the unite kingdom 2004. Web.
7. Ronald Hewlett (2002) Uk Disasters And Emergency Service Communications: Uk Home Office.
8. Gabby Logan (2003) Day That Will Live With Me Forever, Times Online. Web.
9. Ronald Hewlett (2002) Uk Disasters And Emergency Service Communications: Uk Home Office.
10. Weekly news (2009) Hundreds evacuated after flats fire. Web.
11. Peter E. Hodgkinson & Michael Stewa (1991) Coping With Catastrophe: A Handbook of Disaster Management: Routledge.
12. John A. Purkiss (2007) 2^nd ed: Fire safety engineering: Design of structures, Elsevier ltd.
13. Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (2006) Fire and explosions: Workplace fire safety; London. Web.