[SystemSafety] Electrical Safety, Fire Safety

[paul_e.bennett at topmail.co.uk]

On 16/06/2017 at 12:22 PM, "Peter Bernard Ladkin" <ladkin at causalis.com> wrote:
>

[%X]

>Six years later, are such robots available to investigate the 
>Grenfell Tower wreckage, said to be
>unstable? If not, shouldn't we try to ensure some are available 
>for the next disaster in enclosed
>spaces?

They are using flying drones and specialists dogs with cameras to search
where fire-crew are not able to go at present.

>Issues about building safety are difficult. I have my problems 
>nowadays with large buildings and
>escape routes when I am staying in hotels. Newer ones mostly seem 
>OK, but I am also aware that
>evacuation is still more art and luck than science, as Chris 
>Johnson showed a decade or so ago. It's
>a key business in ship classification for cruise vessels, but even 
>so it doesn't work super-well, as
>we learnt with the Costa Concordia. You have potentially 5,000-
>6,000 people on some of the newer craft.

Evacuation policy and escape routes really do need looking at for 
buildings with significant altitude (more than two stories). With Grenfell
tower, they only had one escape route which became flooded with thick
smoke quite quickly and with the advice that many residents were given
about staying put, seemed to have been wrong headed in that situation.

There has been a lot of talk, about Grenfell Tower, about the inherent 
fire integrity of such buildings, but there is suspicion that such inherent
fire integrity was probably compromised by the refurbishment works
carried out just over a year ago.

>Besides electrical safety, the issue of fire-resistent cladding is 
>not new. The issues of sprinklers
>in large buildings, and appropriately-functional evacuation 
>routes, are perennial. Evacuation is a
>tricky business, as Chris Johnson and Karster Loer know. Karsten, 
>BTW, drew up the evacuation plans
>for a open-air rock concert last year, at which there was a 
>violent storm on the first day and
>everyone was evacuated. It's nice to have it proved that your 
>plans work! Evacuation and crowd
>control came into prominence in Germany with the Love Parade 
>disaster in Duisburg in 2010.

The retro-fitting of sprinklers systems have been recommended for such
buildings but for such tall buildings that becomes a major undertaking in
terms of design and water supply.

I have seen reports on mister systems that enable rapid cooling of fires,
which use much less water, so it should be incumbent on those 
responsible for such buildings to examine the best technology to aid in
fire control (rather the the minimal to comply with regulations).

Regards

Paul E. Bennett IEng MIET
Systems Engineer

-- 
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Paul E. Bennett IEng MIET.....<email://Paul_E.Bennett@topmail.co.uk>
Forth based HIDECS Consultancy.............<http://www.hidecs.co.uk>
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