The Blame Game - Part 3

You will be to follow me or look in my feed to see previous Parts of this critical review of construction here in Australia with an emphasis of passive fire protection

Consultants for passive fire protection measures

Sunday morning; NRL Grand final day! A little more text for the blame game article compiled.......................happy reading - WARNING - It's brutal......

Consultants

OK Google……

A Consultant, a person who provides expert advice professionally.

There are several consultant that I feel could add value and help us ensure compliant essential service measures such as passive fire protection. These include:

·      Fire Safety Engineers

·      Fire Protection Engineers

·      Building Services Engineers, and last but not least

·      Specialist passive fire protection consultants

It is my personal view that our problematic installation stem from the fact that passive fire protection is not given the attention that is required. No one is paying any relevant and so called consultants to look at passive fire protection. It is left to the sub-contractors who are installing the various services, such as the plumber and electrician for example.

At the design stage of a building, I would assume the services and which ones are required will be known and there should be a good idea where they will be reticulated or run. We know we need power, plumbing, refrigeration, heating, air conditioning, electrical power and the like.

Where services pass through a fire rated barrier and an opening is created; this needs a fire stopping (passive fire protection) SYSTEM to re-establish or maintain the fire rating (FRL) of the barrier.

As one would say; it’s not rocket science.

So why do we see so many poor attempts at passive fire protection?

I am happy to take a stab from my perspective; I have been mulling over this and making frustrated observations for over 25 years now……………

I will put it down to the Builder not taking the overall responsibility for passive fire protection.

It start with the selection of the fire rated walls; these need to be selected to ensure they have fire tests to allow openings and services to pass through them; one fire test on a blank wall is useless in the REAL world. We see too many new fire wall types that sadly fall into this category.

The budget to build obviously does not afford the luxury of having a Building Services Engineer detail where services will run and what fire stopping system is required for each opening.

The responsibility for creating and ultimately fire stopping opening for services is delegated by the builder to the sub-contractors installing the services. In many ways it’s a free for all. Soon, a well-constructed fire walls or fire rated riser shafts, look like “Swiss Cheese”, holes everywhere and services pushed and poked around like “Spaghetti”. There is no controls to limit the number of opening; proximity of services. It each trade for themselves and I guess the poor apprentice is told to “slap” some fire rated sealant in the hole; “chuck” a fire pillow or two in there, or “bang on” a magical fire collar. There is obviously very little knowledge on how the FRL System can be maintained and we get the same mess; project after project sadly.

It only when and if a Building Surveyor sees part of it that the Builder riser from his so called “Passive Slumber”. Quick call the manufacturers, Promat or Trafalgar; get some advice to fix things and quickly; we need our Occupation Certificate tomorrow!

I feel myself getting a little carried away as I do this brain dump and I apologise if I offend anyone, but remember I believe we are all to blame in some way. Don’t take it personally or shoot the messenger when you read this

It’s sad that so many people involved in construction will read this and if there honest with themselves will say; “Bugger me, Rakic is right!” 

Sone will fall into the defensive mindset and start the blame game.

How does this happen and how do they or we get away with it?

Is it a Legislative / Regulatory issue?

Where was the Certifier?

Why does the Developer get to wash his hand off it?

The Builder is forced to quote low to win the project?

Why is the compliance responsibilities delegated to the services contractors?

Why is a letter saying all opening comply with the NCC and are fire stopped with SYSTEM tested to AS1530 Part 4 and compliant with AS4072.1 accepted when they are clearly not? Why aren’t photos and a passive fire protection log requested by the Building Surveyor / Certifier to keep the Builder and his subcontractors more accountable.

Where is the Builder’s Service Engineer when all this was going on?

Why wasn’t a specialist passive fire protection company used; wait a minute, what is the definition for this company? What qualification or experience do you need? Why aren’t they Passive fire safety ENGINEERS????? There are too many companies masquerading as the passive “Gurus” who sadly just don’t really get it! Yes it’s a damn debacle….

Sadly, many of the problems get covered up by a ceiling, or raised floor!

Does anyone STOP for only “one minute” and think that we are dealing with life safety here?

It’s damn embarrassing and maybe it’s time to start a shame file

Why does the poor building owner, years later have to pay to commission the building correctly for the first time?  

We need to ALL be accountable and start to CHANGE the way things are currently being done.