Like all high-rises in downtown Des Moines, the 20-story Hub Tower is held to a higher fire protection standard — armed with sprinklers, more fire walls and fire-stops aimed at impeding the spread of flames.
But when the historic former Younkers building across the street caught fire last weekend, the city’s top fire officials took no chances: They evacuated the Tower — home to dozens of businesses and hundreds of workers.
City leaders such as Mayor Frank Cownie have praised the Des Moines Fire Department for the way it protected both property and downtown residents March 29, when the massive, unoccupied Younkers building on Walnut Street was gutted. Still, the enormous heap of concrete and steel left in the heart of the city’s core has thrust fire safety into the collective consciousness of downtown dwellers ever since.
The issue comes amid a building boom that is adding new businesses and loft spaces downtown, which has become home to more than 8,000 people. Top of mind for city leaders is whether more needs to be done to protect that major investment in downtown growth, after years of fire-safety improvements and last year’s adoption of the most up-to-date version of the International Fire Code.
Des Moines Fire Marshal Jonathan Lund said he hopes no knee-jerk proposals come in the wake the Younkers building fire, but he anticipates a re-evaluation of the construction portion of the city’s fire code.
“It’s certainly a tragic fire, and it’s a difficult loss for the city,” Lund said. “We always try to re-evaluate after something like this.”
Cownie said he’s been asked in recent days about the safety of different downtown high-rises. He said he believes Des Moines is on the cutting edge of downtown fire protection, but he said fire and building officials will likely get together to re-examine the safety of many buildings.
“A fire like this causes you to rethink and redo everything,” he said. “We want to make sure that everything meets or exceeds every fire code standard we have in place.”
That’s surely good news for residents like Carolyn Fine, a 64-year-old tenant on the 17th floor of Ligutti Tower at 555 Fifth Ave. She knows her building’s fire alarms work, but said she fears a blaze anyway because so many residents in her low-income building abuse drugs and alcohol.
The complex, home to frequent fire and rescue calls, had a fire death last year that was eventually attributed to smoking.
“There’s not enough security here. I listen to my police scanner just in case,” she said. “Because I know if something happened, I’d have to go find my sister, who lives on the 10th floor.”
Downtown sites inspected annually
Des Moines Fire Chief John TeKippe said the East Village and other densely populated areas and buildings are safe. He underscored that all of the new loft, apartment and condo buildings being built or remodeled downtown are required to have fire suppression and sprinkler systems that are more than adequate to protect the number of people inside.
“We’ve had several fires happen in downtown apartment units, and generally our experience has been exactly this: It will start with something like cooking or smoking. Then it activates a single sprinkler head that extinguishes the fire before we get there. … People should feel pretty confident about that,” TeKippe said.
The chief noted every building downtown is inspected at least once a year. Both firefighters assigned to the city’s 10 stations and inspectors in the Fire Prevention Bureau complete the inspections, which totaled 6,554 citywide in 2013, according to the department’s annual report.
While minor fire code violations are a constant issue and cause inspectors to return to some buildings more frequently, no building downtown has any major violations, officials said. One reason: Most occupied buildings downtown have to fix any significant fire code violations in a day or risk having to evacuate, according to TeKippe.
For instance, Wooly’s — a bar and live music venue in the East Village — has been the subject of three complaints in the last two years, TeKippe said.
Lisa Howard, a longtime downtown resident who owns three lofts in Capitol Village near the Statehouse, said she began to question why the fire department was routinely showing up at Wooly’s.
“If a fire happened there, that would be a very serious issue for us,” Howard said of the lofts at 507 E. Locust St., kitty-corner from the music venue. “I’m not knowledgeable enough to know if I should have real concerns with fire hazards or if (the alarms and sprinklers) are malfunctioning.”
The venue has had several minor inspection violations and one major violation — a broken sprinkler. But owners fixed the sprinkler in a day, and the fire suppression system works, TeKippe said.
How city evaluates fire safety measures
The downtown area has had its share of serious fires over the years.
In spring 2012, police charged a Des Moines man with first-degree arson after he set a blaze at Lighthouse Full Gospel Baptist Church at 1600 Capitol Ave., a few blocks east of the state Capitol. James Galbo was convicted last year for starting the fire in the sanctuary, where he slept.
One six-alarm blaze of an occupied apartment complex in 1994 sent 150 residents into the streets in sub-zero temperatures and totaled the building at 917 Locust St.
But TeKippe and others say no major loss of life has occurred, and that’s because regulations for occupied buildings are far more stringent than those for unoccupied structures like the old Younkers building.
Des Moines also has hired two fire-protection engineers in recent years — something no other city in Iowa has done.
They review all the architectural and development plans submitted to the city to see if the suppression systems will be sufficient.
In 2013, a total of 563 inspections or reviews of new construction plans were conducted in Des Moines — a sharp increase, according to the department’s annual report.
“We measure (the fire protection system) against how many people will be in the building and the contents,” TeKippe said. “A remodel where people are expected to remain in the building would have to have a much higher level of protection than one sitting empty.”
Fire suppression systems in new buildings are tested extensively before people move in. “Those places have a lot more safety features than even my own house,” TeKippe said.
Builders at the Younkers site appear to have taken “appropriate” measures to try to protect the building from fire, such as hourlong monitoring after “hot work” like welding, TeKippe said. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration requirement was 30 minutes.
TeKippe said he wouldn’t know until after the fire investigation concludes — if he knows at all — whether having 24-hour security would have made a difference. Fire investigators have not yet been able to pinpoint where the fire started in the seven-floor building or what caused it.
‘After-action’ plan when probe ends
To stay prepared, firefighters conducting inspections learn the layouts of buildings, different passages of possible fire travel, and the locations of elevators and hose hookups, TeKippe said.
Downtown residents also need to be ready, he said.
They should know who to call in an emergency, two ways to exit every building in the event of a fire and who should be notified about their whereabouts afterward.
So were any big lessons learned so far from the experience of fighting such a big blaze near many homes and major businesses?
There were no glaring issues, TeKippe said. “There has been nothing that occurred that made me think we need to fix this and soon,” he said.
Still, he added, once the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives concludes its probe, the department will develop an “after-action” plan based on what is learned.
“An abundance of caution is never enough,” TeKippe said.
Lee Rood’s Reader’s Watchdog column helps Iowans get answers and accountability from public officials, the justice system, businesses and nonprofits. Contact her at lrood@dmreg.com or 515-284-8549.
Des Moines fire figuresLast year, the Des Moines Fire Prevention Bureau investigated 568 fires — fewer than the average of 637 a year. Eighty-seven of those were arson, and 25 arrests were made. • About 54 percent were considered unintentional in nature.• 12 percent were determined to be intentionally set.• 14 percent were considered to be a failure of equipment or other heat source.• The remainder were undetermined or still under investigation, according to the bureau.
The Younkers fire & aftermath onlineAt DesMoinesRegister.com/YounkersFire:Videos• Firefighters tell the story of their escape from the building as the top floors collapsed.• Audio: Hear the calls between dispatch and the teams on the scene.• Review the lingering questions days after the fire.• Hear from the Johnston-based Hansen Co., which said it was doing “hot work” in the hours before the fire.• Listen to a forum in which city leaders discuss what is next for the site.• See more reaction to the fire and raw video of the blaze.Photos• 100 photos: Images from the Younkers building fire and damage.• 71 photos of the massive fire.• 50 photos of the downtown Younkers through the years, plus photos of the Tea Room before renovation.Memories• Share your memories of the time you spent in the building by emailing newsonline@dmreg.com.• Download a special commemorative page on the Younkers building.
Developments since the fireTHE INVESTIGATION: A team with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives spent last week sifting through rubble at the site of the former Younkers department store building in downtown Des Moines. On Friday, city officials said the ATF team was nearing the end of its investigation. In addition to inspecting debris, the team has examined video of the blaze and interviewed dozens of witnesses and other parties.The construction company in charge of the renovation, Hansen Co. of Johnston, said last week that construction crews were doing “hot work” in two areas of the building hours before it was ravaged by fire. However, any areas where welding or cutting metal was done were monitored for at least an hour after those jobs were completed, company officials said.It is not known when — or if — a cause of the fire might be determined.NEXT STEPS: Once the ATF is finished, insurance investigators for Alexander Co., the building’s owner, will conduct an investigation of their own, said David Vos, a project manager with the company. Alexander Co. also expects to have a structural engineer and materials specialist look at the west side of the historic building to determine its stability, Vos said. FIREFIGHTERS: Des Moines firefighters who were inside the Younkers building when the roof collapsed told their stories last week. The minutes the firefighters spent in the northeast stairwell were scary ones.“Knowing everything I know now, I wouldn’t have gone into the building,” said Lt. Randy Jones, a 22-year Des Moines department veteran.“At 3 in the morning I didn’t think we had control of it. It was that bad,” said Lt. Mike Morgan, whose initial job was to listen to the radio and be ready to rescue the team inside the building. “By 5, we had it. Downtown was not going to burn.”STREETS AND SKYWALKS: A main downtown Des Moines street reopened Saturday. Locust Street between Seventh and Eighth streets had been closed since the fire more than a week ago. Equipment that had been blocking the way was removed Saturday morning. GET ALL THE NEWS BREAKS: Find the latest news, photos and videos at DesMoinesRegister.com/YounkersFire — and download our app to get news alerts on your mobile phone or tablet.
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