What voids...

I have just read the report on the fire in 2016 at the Royal Clarence Hotel (RCH) and it sparked some thoughts one voids in older buildings and the implications to fire risk assessors, building owners and operators.

Voids are out of sight and therefore for most building owners or managers out of mind and looking for them are not top of the list of things to do, the report on the RCH is clear in the affect that the voids had on the fire in the building and even suggests the detection and suppression required to tackle this problem, however for me it doesn't emphasise enough the need for a more robust approach to identifying these voids.

In reality a fire risk assessor can only comment on what they see and made are aware of, older buildings can be very deceptive in nature and it could be easy not to notice the rooms don't quite meet, which would indicate a hidden space in between and to be able to see what is above the false ceilings, especially when they have 10 years worth of paint over the ceiling tiles.

There will never be a perfect answer to this, but its still worth pointing out some basics that we in the fire detection, protection and assessment industry should be doing to help building managers and owners to be more aware of the serious implications of not knowing where your voids are and not fully understanding the implications of leaving these areas unprotected.

1. Get some accurate drawings created, this could identify areas that hidden voids could be
2. Get nosy in your building and get that door unlocked that has been closed from before you worked in the building
3. As a fire risk assessor, make it crystal clear that you need to know what is above and below what you can see and ask the client to address points 1 & 2 above
4. Take action on putting in fire stopping, fire suppression and detection such as VESDA

It will never happen?

Have a read through this report above the loss of a building that was originally built in 1769 and was totally devastated by fire that spread through the voids, which from what I can tell were known about prior to the fire. I wonder if the people in charge of that building would make any different choices now, such as installing VESDA or Sprinklers?

In recent years there has been several catastrophic fires and you'll see that there were things that could have been done, from personal experience there is still a lack of urgency in taking action with fire safety and I can only imagine that its the 'it wont happen here' syndrome, well as we all know it will and it does happen to you, so my advice is aimed to two reader types;

1. The industry people - Be more direct and explain the implications and urgency of the situation
2. Building users - Use professional people who you can trust and take immediate action on their advice

Paul Field

The report is on the dsfire Gov UK website in the 'News Section'