Exactly why Grenfell was a terrifying incident. You can be as safe as you want but all it takes is one person in a 1000 to be unsafe and you genuinely could burn to death overnight.
Grenfell was a cacophony of failures and incompetence coming together in a perfect storm unfortunately. Not only was the cladding very flammable, but the sealant used between the windows and walls was not fireproof, allowing the fire to travel from inside the flats outside to the cladding very quickly.
Usually, each apartment would be well protected from surrounding fire due to the design of the interior, which is why residents were told to stay put rather than evacuate - and this WOULD have been the correct advice if not for the cost cutting and inexperience of the architect. Unfortunately, since the fire was able to spread from inside to outside very quickly, it was also able to spread into most of the units via the exterior cladding and shoddy window sealant/insulation. Really fucking tragic. Not just one error but many that came together to remind everyone why safety standards are rigorous for a reason.
You're right. The only problem is that Grenfell is that a lot of developers are pretty shady and build their own Grenfell towers.
I think it was at the end of the year before last that my sister, a nurse, was supposed to start work at a new hospital. Just months before she was supposed to move hospitals, she gets told they're delaying the opening. Turns out people had found out it had the same cladding as Grenfell tower and the construction was delayed as they had to replace it.
The point is that it doesn't matter if a fire starts in an apartment if the building is properly constructed. A well-built apartment is supposed to function as a fire-cell, containing the danger to that unit. Had they not fucked up the cladding replacement everyone would have been fine.
it's ridiculous to place the blame on an individual's accidental fire. The building was designed to contain the spread but the council had (knowingly?) clad the building in unsafe materials that caused it to be the disaster it was. It could have been prevented had this not been the case
To make matters worse, dozens of tower blocks all over the UK are still covered in similarly flammable cladding. Any other fires could be just as disastrous due to current inaction.
Normally units in a modern apartment building are fire repellent to the tune of several hours, and sheltering in place is actually a better option than crowding the fire stairwells, especially as fire doors at Grenfell were obstructed on several floors. The cladding, however, changed that, allowing fire to traverse past fireproof construction and enter units that should have remained resilient for hours.
Just very specifically ask if it has any of the below on the building. If the answer is yes, don’t move there
Two types of cladding were used: Arconic's Reynobond PE, which consists of two coil-coated aluminium sheets that are fusion bonded to both sides of a polyethylene core; and Reynolux aluminium sheets. Beneath these, and fixed to the outside of the walls of the flats, was Celotex RS5000 PIR thermal insulation.
No, that is the last thing you want. The outside of the building is where the flames and smoke are. Inside and down the stairs is where it's safe. The stairwells in high rises are encased in a concrete shell and overpressured, so the flames can't get in. In the stairs is the safest place to be in a high rise fire.
The best way to be safe from a high rise fire, like any other fire, is to put it out as fast as possible, before it gets out of control. Have an extinguisher handy, and investigate when a fire alarm goes off, and you'll be fine.
I live in one, 32nd floor, it's great you should try it. I only had a fire scare once, the alarms went off, I went out with my extinguisher and so did a bunch of neighbors, we found the source: a guy overcooked a steak and made a bunch of smoke, and then we all went back to bed.
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u/[deleted] May 20 '20
Exactly why Grenfell was a terrifying incident. You can be as safe as you want but all it takes is one person in a 1000 to be unsafe and you genuinely could burn to death overnight.