Sprinklers prevent kitchen fire from spreading at Melbourne apartments

from floridatoday

May 14, 2013   |  

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The blaze was reported about 9:30 p.m. Monday at the Via Tuscany Apartments in Melbourne. / Google map

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J.D. Gallop

FLORIDA TODAY

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Brevard County Fire-Rescue investigators credited sprinklers with containing a kitchen fire that led to the temporary evacuation of a three-story Melbourne apartment complex overnight.

No one was injured. The blaze was reported about 9:30 p.m. Monday at the Via TuscanyApartments, 321 Tuscany Way.

“Initially we got the call for an activated fire alarm. Then people started calling in saying there was an actual fire,” said Lt. Don Slayman, spokesman for Brevard County Fire-Rescue.

About 30 firefighters responded to the site and put out the kitchen fire, however, officials reported some smoke and water damage.

“The fire sprinklers had been activated and they quickly prevented any further spread of fire.”

Residents were allowed to return to their apartments a short time later. The complex’s management were able to move the tenant of the affected residence into a vacant apartment.

An investigation is ongoing.

Ontario mandate for fire sprinklers in retirement homes a Canadian first

from yahoo

By Steve Mertl | Daily Brew – 9 hours ago

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Getty Images/File/Joe Raedle photoI guess it's not surprising that there's a push on in Ontario to retrofit older nursing homes with automatic fire sprinklers as the leading edge of the Baby Boom is contemplating the prospect of long-term care.

To be fair, though, the issue has been front-and-centre for years in a province that has one of the worst records in North America for institutional fire deaths.

An inquest into the 2009 nursing-home fire in Orillia, Ont., that killed four seniors and injured six others last year recommended all retirement homes and assisted-living centres be retrofitted, theToronto Star reported at the time. New facilities have required sprinklers since 1998.

But the same day the coroner's jury made its recommendations, a fire at an older seniors' residence in Hawksbury, Ont., claimed two more lives, Christie Blatchford noted in the National Post.

[ Related: Mandatory sprinklers at retirement homes among fire code changes ]

Blatchford also observed that three previous inquests had resulted in the same recommendation but the Ontario government failed to act.

According to the Ontario Fire Marshall, some 4,300 care facilities in the province do not have sprinklers, Blatchford wrote. said. Since 1980, 46 seniors have died in Ontario care-home fires.

The elderly and disabled living in institutions are especially vulnerable to fire because of the difficulty in evacuating the buildings quickly.

This week, Ontario Community Safety Minister Madeleine Meilleur announced the provincial Fire Code and Building Code would be amended to require all facilities where seniors, the disabled or other vulnerable people live to be retrofitted with sprinkler systems, CTV News reported.

“The new measures will improve fire safety for all people in Ontario living in these homes and it will give peace of mind for their loved ones,” Meilleur said.

The Toronto Star estimated more than 200,000 Ontarians live such facilities.

What's taken so long, you might ask?

The obvious answer is cost. Many facilities are privately owned and profit-oriented businesses reluctant to spend money if they aren't forced to do so.

The Star's story on the new regulations give some indication of the price tag. Revera Inc. said it spent $55 million adding sprinklers to its retirement homes in Canada, with the cost ranging from $250,000 to $1 million.

“We believe it was the right thing to do because safety is important to us,” Revera senior vice-president Janet Ko told the Star. “It was a significant investment.”

Ko added all retirement-home chains have been working towards retrofitting.

"It boosts the confidence levels of all seniors ... and their families," she said.

But public institutions seem equally unwilling to spend the money, if only because governments seem perennially cash-strapped.

The Ontario government is giving retirement homes five years to carry out the retrofit work, starting next January, and publicly-owned facilities have until 2025, the Star reported.

[ Related: Two seniors remain in acute care after nursing home fire ]

Meilleur said the long time frames allow facilities with more than four residents to do the retrofits within their renovation cycles.

Ontario is the first province to mandate such a broad sprinkler retrofit program for care homes, so its success should be watched closely by other provinces.

A 2011 post on PTSC Online, a site for fire and emergency organizations, said the likelihood of dying in a care-home fire is five times the national fire fatality rate and three times higher than in care facilities in the United States, where sprinklers are mandated for any institution receiving federal funds.

With no national code, it's up to the provinces to make the needed change, said Sean Tracy, Canadian regional director of the National Fire Protection Association.

"We need to change as this fire death rate should be unacceptable in any developed country that purports to care for its elder and infirm," he wrote.

5 Myths About Home Fire Sprinklers

from claimsjournal.com

May 8, 2013

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The Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) is helping to dispel five common myths about fire sprinklers, and highlighting the benefits of home sprinklers to kickoff Fire Safety and Awareness Week (May 6-12), which is part of National Building Safety Month in May.

5 MYTHS ABOUT HOME FIRE SPRINKLERS

1. When one sprinkler goes off, all the sprinklers activate.

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The sprinkler heads react to temperatures in each room individually, allowing only the sprinkler closest to the fire to activate. In fact, 90 percent of fires are contained by the operation of just one sprinkler.

2. A sprinkler could accidentally go off, causing severe water damage to a home.

Records show that the likelihood of this occurring is very remote. In addition, residential fire sprinklers are designed and tested to minimize such accidents.

3. Water damage from a sprinkler system will be more extensive than fire damage.

The sprinkler system will limit a fire’s growth. Therefore, damage from a residential sprinkler system will be much less severe than the smoke and fire damage if the fire had continued unabated, or the water damage caused by firefighting hose lines.

4. Home sprinkler systems are expensive.

The cost of installing home fire sprinklers averages $1.61 per square foot for new construction, according to the Home Fire Sprinkler Cost Assessment report produced by the Fire Protection Research Foundation. To put the cost of a sprinkler system into perspective, that is roughly the same amount people pay for carpet upgrades, a paver stone driveway or a whirlpool bath – none of which save lives.

5. Requiring residential fire sprinklers will inhibit new home construction.

A 2009 study conducted on behalf of the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) compared residential home construction in four counties in Maryland and Virginia – two with sprinkler mandates and two without. The study concluded the presence of sprinkler mandates did not have a negative effect on the number of homes being built.

Benefits of Fire Sprinklers

A residential fire occurs every 87 seconds, according to the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA), with half of all home fire deaths occurring between 11:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m., according to the NFPA.

Residential fire sprinklers can contain a fire and may even extinguish it before firefighters arrive, according to the Home Fire Sprinkler Coalition. This provides valuable extra time to get everyone out of the house. Sprinklers reduce civilian fire deaths by an estimated 83 percent; reduce direct property damage by more than two-thirds per fire; and are responsible for an estimated 65 percent reduction in firefighter injuries, according to the NFPA.

The District of Columbia adopted a fire sprinkler installation building code requirement for all residences built after Jan.1, 2011. The result – fire deaths declined in the District from 33.4 in 2009 to 8 in 2011 and 2012 combined. In Maryland, State Fire Marshal Steven Barnard cited the state’s fire sprinkler requirement in newly built, multi-family dwellings as a significant factor in the 22 percent drop in fire-related deaths in the state in 2012.

“There is no disputing the fact that residential fire sprinklers can save lives and prevent significant property damage,” said Julie Rochman, IBHS president and CEO. “To that end, IBHS urges state lawmakers to protect the lives, safety and welfare of their constituents by adopting a residential fire sprinklers requirement for all new homes in their state building code.”

Source: IBHS at DisasterSafety.org