I REPORT

THE SAFEWAY WAREHOUSE FIRE

BYRICHARD M. PATTON, P.E.

FIRE PROTECTION ENGINEER

FOREWARDThe fire sprinkler system represents the best solution to

fire yet developed by man. Historic data demonstratesthat when sprinkler protection is proper for the hazard,the system will produce approximately a 99.9% reliabilityof fire control. However, in the United States, under thecontrol of the National Fire Protection Association thesprinkler system has a much higher failure rate, particu-larly so in the high hazard properties.

In this report, we will explain how improper design willproduce unsafe systems not capable of controlling theexpected fire. We do this with considerable ambiva-lence. On the one hand, knowing that the fire sprinklersystem has many enemies, we anticipate that some willattempt to use portions of this report to further attackand discredit sprinkler protection as a concept.

On the other hand, knowing that it is not the concep-tual sprinkler system itself that is flawed (but rather thecodes and the regulators who make the system less thanit should be) it becomes necessary to reveal the regulato-ry flaws in order to correct the injustices of subvertedprotection.

Look at it this way. It is possible for engineers to designfine machinery such as a Mercedes, Ferrari or Porsche.But, it is also possible to take the finest automobile in theworld and place it in the hands of an 18 year old schoolboy novice driver and send both down a rain slick wind-ing mountain road with disaster resulting. Is it the carthat failed? Is it the driver? Or, is it the committee thatselected the driver?

Those who have been at the regulatory controls of thefire sprinkler system machinery produced the Safewaywarehouse disaster. The sprinkler system within thebuilding was just one of the victims of the disaster.

This report will have two parts. One will be the techni-cal side explaining why the system failed. The other por-tion will be a discussion of the political and economicenvironment of the code system and of how these im-pacted on the system.

The Safeway warehouse in Richmond, California wasan enormous building. It measured approximately 650 x750 feet, or nearly one half million square feet. In com-parsion, a football field measures 300 x 160 feet, or 48,000square feet. Thus, ten football fields could be laid out inthe structure. The building was one story with a maxi-mum height of approximately 27 feet.

Storage was mainly on racks, with considerable palletstorage as well. Storage height was 16 feet apparently.There are indications that some storage probably was 20feet high. The pallet storage was reported as being as

much as 5 pallets deep, 3 or 4 pallets high (minimum of 16feet to a maximum of 20 feet in height). Reportedly, thepallet storage butted up against the racks. Since thebuilding and the contents were destroyed, there is someuncertainty relative to the storage configurations.

It is probable that the fire [July 11, 1988] started when afork lift broke a mercury vapor light fixture at the roofand heated material fell on to the top of 3 high (possibly 4high) pallet storage involving paper towels in cardboardcartons. Employees attempted to fight the fire with fireextinguishers, apparently with men being lifted up byfork lifts. Also, reportedly at least one fork lift operatorwas attempting to remove pallet loads from the tops ofthe piles and reduce pile size to make fire fighting easier.There were no hose lines available within the building forfire fighting. Obviously, the fire extinguishers were 'puny'in relation to the fire potential.

The building was completely sprinklered supplied by 14sprinkler risers. The systems were of 'pipe schedule de-sign' for ordinary hazard occupancy, apparently basedon a 1957 issue, or earlier, of NFPA-13. The systemswere dead ended with a spacing of 10 feet between headson lines, 12 feet between lines (120 sq. ft. coverage). Thesprinkler temperature rating was 165'F, and orifice sizewas 1/2 inch (k= 5.6).

Automatic (165'F fusable link operated) smoke ventswere installed. Each vent was 48 sq. ft. in size, with onevent per 4800 square foot of roof area. Draft curtains alsowere installed.

The water supply feeding the sprinkler systems includ-ed a 10 inch loop fed by city water connection at about 80psi. But, the loop was also fed by a 1500 gpm fire pump at125 psi drafting from a 1/4 million gallon reservoir. A 25gpm jockey pump kept the loop pressure at 130 psi(pump would operate when pressure dropped to 80 psi).

Use of the warehouse at the time the fire occurred wasessentially the same as when the building was built in1957. The fire started at the top of pallet storage consis-ting of paper towels in cardboard cartons, which wascertainly within the storage intent of the building whenconstructed. Today, the storage might be consideredcommodity class 3, and with storage above 12 feet inheight, sprinkler design criteria would be as required byNFPA-213C.

However, with the fire initiating presumably at the TOPof the pallet storage, it could be argued that if the storageheight (assumed 16 feet) was reduced to 12 feet, and roofheight was also lowered, theNFPA-13 code (1988 issue)would still permit a similar design pipe schedule systemto be installed in the building. Such protection would bepermitted, even with a MUCH WEAKER water supplythan that which was available at the Safeway complex.

II FIRE PROTECTION CONTRACTOR OCTOBER, 1981

Thus, it would be wrong to attribute this loss to a'change in occupancy' or to a 'no longer acceptable' de-sign code. The safer course is to examine the sprinklersystem as it was designed at the time, and as it couldSTILL be installed as per the current code in a similarwarehouse of lower roof and storage height. This is nec-essary if we are to properly identify conditions that mayrepresent fire dangerous potentials in other similar build-ings. Design flaws that could be reapplied to new con-struction even today, should be defined and corrected.

The building was enlarged in 1964, but was not a signifi-cant factor because the fire occurred and grew to enor-mous size within the older section before entering anddestroying the extension. The sprinkler systems weresupervised by the ADT company. However, there ap-pears to have been, for whatever reason, a delay of prob-ably at least 5 minutes, quite possibly more than 10 min-utes, between fire initiation and fire department notifica-tion.

When the fire engines entered the property at approxi-mately 9 minutes after receiving the alarm, four sprinklersystems had already operated, indicating a MASSIVEsprinkler system failure with probably at least 500 to 1000sprinkler heads already opened. The building was AL-READY LOST before the fire department arrived. Theprimary purpose of this report and the related study wasto determine WHY the sprinkler systems failed to con-trol the fire, and recommend corrective action.

CHRONOLOGY OF THE FIREBased on reports supplied by the Richmond Fire De-

partment and the ADT company, the chronology of thefire was as follows:1. Time: T:0

Event: Fire Initiation.Comment: Fire starts on top of three pallet highpaper storage in cartons near the center of thewarehouse.

2A. Time: T:1Event: Sprinkler system Al operates. Pump

starts.Comment: Sprinkler does not adequately con-trol the fire. Additional sprinklers open.Note: Exact times of initiation of manual fire fight-ing and sprinkler operation are questionable.Therefore, Ti and T2 are unknowns and could bein reverse order.

2B. Time: 1:2Event: Fire fighting initiated by employees.Comment: Attempts to fight fire with fire ex-tinguishers unsuccessful.

3. Time: 10:02Event: Telephone notification, Safeway em-ployee to fire department.Comment': First notification received. Ap-parently fire fighting has been in progress for a con-siderable time when phone call is made.

4. Time: 10:03Event: Telephone notification to fire de-partment by ADT operator.Comment: Presumably, ADT has already re-ceived water flow alarms from system Cl, systemAl and fire pump. Presumably first involved sprin-kler system (Al) has already suffered massivefailure. Fire is setting off sprinklers in more remotesystem as well as system directly above the fire.FME PROTECTION CONTRACTOR

5. Time: 10:04Event: Manual fire alarm system signal is

received.Comment: Engines are en route.

6. Time: 10:07Event: Second alarm.Comment: Responding forces enact "secondalarm" en route when they see the extent of smokeand fire coming through the roof.

7. Time: 10:07Event: ADT receives water flow alarms

from system D4. (Three systemsnow operating.)

Comment: Probable number of already oper-ated sprinkler heads is 300 to 500 or more, indi-cating massive heat spread. Possibility of fire con-trol by sprinkler system is zero.

8. Time: 10:08Event: Sprinkler system E33 is now

operating.Comment: Number of open sprinklers with fourseparate systems operating probably exceeds500, perhaps 1,000. Massive quantities of water arebeing wasted as fire spreads below failed systems.

9. Time: 10:09Event: Fire department arrives at scene.Comment: Four sprinkler systems are alreadyoperating. This represents massive system failureand extensive fire spread. Possibility of control offire, located deep within confines of warehouse andspreading with extreme rapidity, is nil.

10. Time: 10:14Event: Three more sprinkler systems are

now operating, A3, Cl, and B2.Comment: With seven operating sprinkler sys-tems, probable number of open heads is 1000 to2500 of the total of 6000.

11. Time: 10:15Event: Third alarm sounded. Instructions

issued to pump water into sprinklersystem.

Comment: Sprinkler reinforcing no longer use-ful, huge amounts of water being spilled. But, it isdoubtful fire officers comprehend how massive thesprinkler failure is at this time.

FIRE SPRINKLER SYSTEMS DESIGN FLAWSAS RELATED TO THE SAFE WAYWAREHOUSE FIRE

Fire sprinkler system design parameters were set into adesign standard by the National Fire Protection Associa-tion in 1896. For at least the next fifty years, those whowere in control of this standard brought progress insprinkler work to a dead stop. Amazingly little progresswas allowed in this field between the 1890's and the1950's. During the 1950's, I became research director rel-ative to fire protection systems for the distilling industry.In short order we discovered many advances in designthat could be readily employed which could reduce sys-tem costs and also improve quality.

However, those who controlled the NFPA standards,and therefore the commerce of fire safety, took actionsto obstruct and limit such advances. Accordingly, itshould be understood that when fire sprinkler systemsfail to control fire because of poor design, the root cause

OCTOMM,

is not so much ignorance or unplanned for errors. It is, toa large degree, a matter of willful intent to subvert bettertechnology.

The following sprinkler design flaws and deficiencieswere solidified in the NFPA-13 sprinkler standards at thetime that the sprinkler systems were installed in the Safe-way warehouse. Many of these design flaws still exist inthe 1988 code, sometimes to a somewhat reduced de-gree. All of the flaws do not necessarily relate to this par-ticular fire.

1. Pipe schedule design methods produce a system ofunknown quality. Often, pipe schedule systems arequite weak for the occupancy.

2. Common use of dead end systems that are strongnear the rise but often very weak at the perimeters.

3. Over standardization of sprinkler head sizes (ori-fice and k factor) resulting in improper fitting of thesprinkler to the hazard. In this instance, the use of a1/2 inch sprinkler (k=5.6) for a warehouse of thisnature was a major design error.

4. Failure to correlate the water supply with the sys-tem delivery capability. Sometimes the requiredwater supply was (and still is) two to ten times thesystem delivery capability.

5. A strong orientation built into the standard (bothpipe schedule and hydraulic design methods) forapplying relatively weak densities over large as-sumed sprinkler operating areas, and opposition tothe concept of applying very strong densities dir-ectly over the early fire. A very important factor inthis fire.

6. Strong code and sprinkler industry opposition tothe use of large orifice sprinklers keyed to largerareas of coverage. Also, strong opposition to allow-ing the engineer to determine head spacing andorifice sizing to produce a given required density.

7. Simplistic hazard classifications relative to thebuilding perimeters and the occupancy fire pot-ential, including such matters as fire loading, build-ing height, and building size.

8. Narrow spray pattern for the standard sprinklerand resistance to opening the spray pattern up soas to allow wider spaced sprinklers.

9. When designing hydraulically, design methods thatoften produce a system that will provide a WEAKINITIAL DENSITY (when first one to four headsopen).

HYDRAULIC ANALYSIS, INSTALLEDSYSTEM

The fire sprinkler systems that failed were of the or-dinary hazard pipe schedule design method whichmeans that the delivery capability of the system in termsof density (gpm/sq.ft.) was unknown at the time of de-sign. However, based on the best information availablerelative to the design and water supply, we used a com-puter hydraulic program to determine the minimum hy-draulics of the system. The delivery capability was ex-plored for design areas from the 'first four operatingsprinklers' to the point where '3000 square feet' of headswere assumed to have opened. The results are shown inTable 1.

Note that density drops as the number of operatingsprinklers increases. If the first four open sprinklers at

OCTOBER, MO

0.44 density failed to control ceiling temperature, it beassumed that when 3000 sq.ft. of sprinklers have openedand density has dropped to 0.25 gpm/sq.ft., the prob-ability of control would be slim.

With the city connection, the water mains probablycould deliver 2000 to 3000 gpm to the base of any sprin-kler system in the building. However, if we assume theexpected early fire will NOT exceed more than 400 sq.ft. of burning material, the maximum amount of watercapable of being delivered directly to the early fire isshown to be about 180 gpm in Table 1.

many as 100). Therefore, always when the first one tofour heads open, pressure at the orifices of these earlyopening heads will be STRONGER than it will be whenall heads in the design area have opened. Thus, the BESTCHANCE at fire control occurs when the fire is stillSMALL and the number of open sprinklers is STILL onlyFOUR or less. This also applies to pipe schedule design,of course, even though the system performance is an un-known. Now the question is this: when ONLY one tofour heads are open how much stronger will the EARLYdensity be as related to the design density?

TABLE 1— PERFORMANCE OF SAFEWAY WAREHOUSE SPRINKLER SYSTEM

4 480 0.44 89-98 (0.9) 216 1809 1000 0.38 66-101 (0.65) 450 18013 1500 0.34 53-96 (0.59) 625 167***17 2000 0.30 41-88 (0.47) 760 15221 2500 0.26 31-76 (0.41) 850 13625 3000 0.25 29-86 (0.34) 1000 133* As per flow from sprinkler with lowest orifice pressure.4* Indicates degree of hydraulic imbalance.*** System is probably 'failing' at this point.

TABLE 2— EARLY DENSITYDesign Area Covered Selecteddensity Per Head k factorgpnV sq.ft.sq.ft0.30 120 5.60.30 120 11

Design Design Early Early Earlysprinkler orifice orifice sprinkler densityflow gpm pressure pressure discharge gpm/sq.ft.

psi psi gPm36 41 95 54 0.4536 10.7 95 107 0.89

From the above table it is apparent that three things areoccurring as the number of opened sprinklers increasesfrom four to many.1. Density (gpm/sq.ft.) falls.2. Variations in density (imbalance) increases.

Whether the fire will happen to be located belowthe stronger area, or the weaker area, is not pre-dictable.

3. Total water reaching the fire core diminishes. Theamount of water being delivered outside the firezone increases.

As for the size of the fire itself, probably in most casesthe early (stronger) discharge will contain the fire andstop or slow its growth. However, if the early discharge(with only a few heads open) does not control ceilingtemperatures adequately, as more heads open, the con-trol capability of the spray right above the fire site willdiminish. Sooner or later, (in most cases) the fire will thengrow larger, further overpowering the system until fail-ure occurs.

EARLY DENSITYIt is customary under the hydraulic design regulations

of NFPA-13 to design for a large number of sprinklers toopen (from 1500 sq.ft. of sprinklers up to 5000 sq.ft. ofsprinklers - which could be as few as 7 sprinklers to as12 FIRE PROTECTION CONTRACTOR

Here's an illustration. Assume that the DESIGN DENSI-TY is 0.30 gpm/sq.ft. over 2000 sq.ft. and that the sprin-kler spacing is 120 sq.ft. Also assume that the designerhas the option to SELECT orifice size. Note the varia-tions within Table 2.

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ILLUSTRATION #1As may be seen in illustration #1, when density may be at a relativelylow pressure, say 10 psi, the increase in pressure when only 1 to 4heads open will result in great increase in discharge. Accordingly theorifice site should be an engineering design seledion.

OCTOBER, 19113.

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14 FIRE PROTECTION CONTRACTOR

DROP SIZEThe average water drop size that emits from a sprinkler

orifice is dependent on two factors. One is orifice size.The other is orifice pressure. If pressure is held constant,and the two heads of different orifice size are flowing, thehead with the smaller orifice will produce a smaller drop.Fires in high rack and pallet storage are capable of burn-ing with ferocious up drafts. Large drop size is necessaryin order for the water spray to penetrate the fire plume.

The th inch sprinkler that was installed in the Safewaywarehouse was a small orifice head for the hazard type.When high pressure was applied by the fire pump to thissmall orifice head, the drop size produced was tiny forthe job. Presumably much of the early spray (approach-ing a fog) was swept away by the up drafts.

THE SHAPE OF THE UMBRELLAThe so called standard (h inch) sprinkler design was

locked into a test procedure at Underwriters Lab. Fourheads were installed at the corners of a 10 x 10 footsquare with a large wood crib located below the center ofthe square. The sprinkler head manufacturers found itnecessary to design a deflector that threw a high percent-age of the water down toward that large wood crib fire.The resultant deflector produced an uneven spray pat-tern with too much of the water going down and too littledistributed widely. For decades, the sprinkler designstandard allowed this narrow spray pattern sprinkler tobe installed only 18 inches above the top of a storage pile.When so located, the water pattern wetted only a smalldiameter circle at the top of the pile. Little, if any of thewater carried over to the side of the pile. Whether or notthis poor spray pattern had an adverse effect on the sys-A

, tem s ability to control the storage pile fire in the Safewaywarehouse is speculative. But the lab test proceduresthat required a very uneven spray pattern for listed sprin-klers certainly did not help, and the narrow spray patternsprinklers are still the 'standard' sprinkler heads in 1988.

SPRINKLER OPERATING TEMPERATURETests involving high piled stock and fife sprinkler sys-

tems demonstrated that there are two ways to reducethe total number of sprinklers that operate in a fire. Thebest way, of course, is to produce a spray that is capableof quickly controlling ceiling temperatures. Another wayis to install high temperature sprinklers 212'F, or betteryet, 286'F. The high temperature heads slow down thefirst response a little. But sprinklers outside the immedi-ate fire area are much less likely to open prematurely.

The sprinkler heads installed in the Richmond ware-house not only were low temperature (165'F), but a typedesigned specifically to be quick to operate. This wasprobably a factor in the ability of the early fire to open toomany heads, thus reducing the quality of the system atthe fire site.

DRAFT STOPSThe Safeway warehouse building was equipped with

draft stops at the roof. In theory, these curtain-like draftstops are intended to compartmentalize the roof relativeto heat coming off afire, and confine the heat to one draftstopped area above the fire. Presumably this will limit thenumber of operating sprinklers to an acceptable num-ber. The concept as usually applied is more "window

See FIRE, page 60

OCTOSE11.1404

Note that in both cases, the designer designed to pro-vide a 0.30 density over 2000 sq.ft. of floor area. When ak=5.6 sprinkler was used at 120 sq.ft. spacing, a strongEARLY pressure of 95 psi increased density only to 0.45.

However, when large orifice sprinkler was used in-stead of the k:--5.6 (small orifice) sprinkler the EARLYhigh pressure produced an initial density of 0.89 gpm/sq.ft. Such VERY FffGH density that can be achievedEARLY in a fire's development will dramatically improvethe probability of fire control.

Two things are apparent from analysis of TABLE 2.One is that a ih inch sprinkler (k.6) is an IMPROPERselection for a spacing of 120 sq. ft. in a situation where amoderately strong density (0.30 gpm/sq.ft.) is needed.The second is that the EARLY FIRE CONTROL capa-bility of the system will be VERY WEAK in relation to theachievable quality.

Compare TABLE 2 with TABLE 1 and see how theycorrelate. Note that when 2000 sq.ft. of sprinkler headsare open in TABLE 1 (Safeway warehouse system) about152 gallons will be delivered to the fire (assumed 400 sq.ft. size). When only four heads are open, the INMALDELIVERY to the fire site should have been much great-er because of the very high pressure pump. But, the sys-tem installed had a very flat density curve and the veryhigh pressure would deliver only 180 gpm to the fire site.

If k=11 sprinklers had been installed instead, the earlyhigh pressure would have delivered approximately 106gpm out of the four open sprinklers and the total waterdelivered to a 400 sq.ft. size fire would have been 355 gal-lons (0.886 average density). (Here we are assuming apiping system layout also proper for the occupancy).

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FIRE, cont. from page 14dressing" than substance, and this was certainly the casehere. The draft stopped areas were far larger than theacceptable areas of sprinkler operation. Or, putting it an-other way, if ALL the sprinklers within the confines ofone draft stop compartment were to operate, the sprin-kler system would be well beyond the failure point. Also,heated air currents generally are NOT contained within adraft stop but rather tend to "roll below" the stop muchas a wave will roll over a log partly buried in the sand.There is little evidence to suggest that the draft curtainsprovided a useful purpose here.

AUTOMATIC ROOF VENTSIn general, if a sprinkler system adequately controls the

fire, gravity type roof vents are of little value. This is be-cause combustion products, when adequately cooled,drift down toward the floor.

When the sprinkler system does NOT adequately con-trol the fire, then the heated gases will have buoyancy tovent through the roof. This could have value if the sprin-klers fail to control the ceiling temperatures, but the firedepartment arrives while the fire is still controllable withhose streams. Another assumed function of the roofvents is to limit the spread of heated gases at the roof.Many presumed experts of fire safety promote the ideathat draft stops combined with roof vents will maintainthe heated gases to the compartmented area as thegases vent. However, there is much to suggest in this fire,and other past fires, that the heat dynamics of a majorfire (that has defeated the sprinkler system) are far be-yond the limitations of these devices.

When vents are installed with low temperature fusabletriggers (165'F) as in this case, it's conceivable that earlyoperation of the vents could cause premature drafts andfresh air delivery to the fire site. This might diminish thesprinkler's ability to control the fire. The choice of temp-perature rating for the vents was poor in this case.

LACK OF HOSE LINESSince the earliest testing of high piled stock by the Fac-

tory Insurance Association (now I.R.I.), it has been ac-cepted logic that the small hose lines are essential to highpiled warehouses. The reason is that a sprinkler systemCANNOT guarantee full, 100% fire extinguishment insuch properties (because of obstructions to the spray).Even if and when the pile collapses, there still could beconcealed packets of fire. Thus, it is usually necessary insuch occupancies to complete the fire control with hoselines. Why hose line protection was not installed is notclear. But, it would seem that the various inspectorswould be remiss if they did not recommend them.

POSSIBLE EXPLANATION OF VERY RAPIDAND WIDE SCALE SPRINKLER HEADOPERATION

The fire appeared to operate an excessive number ofsprinklers very rapidly. Possibly within ten to fifteen min-utes of fire initiation, the number of open sprinklers wasinto the thousands. Why?

There appears to be several things that would be con-tributing factors, including:1. Very heavy occupancy fire load.2. Combination of small orifice sprinkler at highII FOE PROTECTION CONTRACTOR

pressure.3. Sprinkler heads rated at 165'F and of a type that

could be defined as -early type fast acting.-4. Early density from dead end pipe schedule system

inadequate for fire potential.The very hot up drafts could be expected to vaporize

much of the fine spray into steam. The up drafts wouldthen carry both the steam vapor and the smaller (hot)drops across the roof. When this combination of com-bustion gases, steam vapor, and small heated waterdrops encountered a cooler body (that was a good heatconductor, such as a sprinkler head) the steam would becondensed by the encountered cooler surface causing avery efficient heat transfer to the fusable element.

This suggests that it was probably a major error to em-ploy sprinkler heads rated near or below the boiling pointof water in a warehouse of this type. If sprinkler headshad been rated 286'F, the operation of extra sprinklersoutside the immediate fire would have been slowed and itis conceivable that the fire may have been still control-lable when the fire department arrived.

HISTORIC SPRINKLER SYSTEM FAILUREEXPERIENCE WITHIN THE U.S.

First, it should be clearly understood that the fire sprin-kler system is by far the most reliable fire control deviceever developed. There is clear data (mainly from foreigncountries) that substantiate that the sprinkler systemcan be designed to be 99.9% reliable. In the UnitedStates, however, with the design parameters and pro-ducts controlled by NFPA, the insurance industry, andtesting laboratories, sprinkler system reliability has beenheld far below its full potential. Ironically, the controlshave also produced excessively costly systems.

Officially, according to NFPA, the NFPA controlledsprinkler system has approximately a 4% failure rate.But, there is much to suggest that the NFPA criteria pro-duced 'over design' for light hazard properties and'under design' for high hazard properties. Thus, a dis-proportionate high percent of the failures probably areassociated with the larger and high hazard properties.

ILLUSTRATION 2 below is taken from the NFPA handbook and it shows that there are many fires involvingsprinkler systems where ten heads or more open. There

PROPER PROTECTION DESIGN (FOR THE'VERY HIGH HAZARD' RISKS)

A proper design of fire protection would include ALLof the following.1. Sprinkler system design shall NOT be controlled

by any organization with a direct conflict of interestwith the sprinkler industry (such as the insuranceindustry).

2. Design shall be for a gridded, balanced system, hy-draulically calculated with engineer having designresponsibility beyond that currently allowed byNFPA standards.

3. Density of at least 0.6 gpm/sq.ft., preferably 1.0gpm/sq.ft. over the early fire. Density to hold at orabove 0.6 with 1500 sq.ft. of open heads for largearea buildings.

4. Sprinkler head of 286'F rating,.wide angle deflector,orifice with k factor of at least 11. Clearance of 4feet or more, deflector to storage top. Sprinklersshall be installed within the racks.

5. There must be subdivision of storage piles andracks.

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inch size) with adjustable spray/straight streamnozzles. Hose streams to be supplied by the elec-trically monitored sprinkler mains. (UL listing ofhose unnecessary.)

7. All sprinkler systems must be electrically super-vised with the water flow switches guaranteedoperable with 30 seconds of sprinkler head opening(gridded system is more readily purged of air withreduced alarm system delay).

8. Draft stops are not needed or useful. Roof vents, ifprovided, should be power (fan) operated, zoned,and to be operated only by the fire department.

, 4. A building of such huge size as the Safeway ware-house should be divided into three or more sep-arated 'four walled' buildings with communicationonly via protected tunnels. (Automatic roof ventsin tunnels ARE desirable.).

10. Fit the water supply to the EARLY FIRE needs,with a very strong density (at or above 0.60 gpm/sq.ft.) at least 500-1000 sq.ft. Huge facilities wheremany millions of dollars are at risk warrant watersupplies much stronger than the 'minimum' sprin-kler demand. To the contrary, small high hazardrisks should never be DENIED sprinkler protectionwith the excuse that the 'available water is inade-quate.' Small buildings can be protected to a farhigher level than the Safeway warehouse was pro-tected using the concept of a PROPERLY EN-GINEERED sprinkler system (plus small hose) cap-able of dislodging 500 gpm or less effectively on theEARLY FIRE.

Key the supply duration to the running time of the firedepartment with automatic notification. If necessary,rely on the fire department drafting from reservoirs otheravailable water sources for hose streams. Do NOT denythe facility automatic protection because full automatichose stream water supply is not available as this is a mostLUDICROUS policy.

CONCLUSIONThe systems that failed represented extremely POOR

relative to theneeds of the occupancy. The NFPA

are two logical explanations for more than ten heads toopen.

1. Flash fire (such as a major flammable liquid spillfire) that produces an enormous quick release ofheat (considered infrequent).

2. System is inadequate to control the early fire, firetherefore grows large and opens ten or more heads(considered common).

Category 2 above is usually a system failure. But inmany cases, either the fire department controls the fire,or the fire is limited and destruction of the building doesNOT occur. Therefore, such system failures are oftennot reported as failures.

Statistics suggest that "non-tallied- failures of the NEPAcontrolled sprinkler systems are fairly common in theU.S.

standards not only promoted improper design methods,the standard actually established barriers that made pro-per design 'non-standard' and therefore prohibitive. Thewater supply was far excessive to the delivery ability ofthe system. The sm#11 orifice head and the 165°F fusiblelink were improper choices for a warehouse.A fire of this magnitude had the potential to kill many oc-

cupants and many firemen. A sprinkler system designedto current standards of NFPA would be improved, butstill far inferior to the protection that good engineeringcould provide.

Those who controlled the sprinkler regulations mustbear a responsibility for this loss.

THE LESSONSBy far the most important lesson to be learned from this

fire is that the businessman and the public are NOTbeing properly served and advised by outside fire codemaking, inspection, and/or so called fire protection en-gineering services.

In this case, the primary fire code involved was littlemore than a public safety facade behind which specialinterests maneuvered to structure the market place toserve a few. The building owners bought a code designedfire sprinkler system that was guaranteed to fail underthe worst anticipated fire conditions of the occupancy.

The code was the product of an organization and aa committee that worked to PREVENT any fire sprinklersystem marketed in America to be anything different orbetter than their STANDARD system. Then also specifi-cally barred better technology from the code, holding itto a low level of technical competency.

The code system has structured its legal defenses sothat when fires occur almost invariably the code systemitself is exonerated and the owner or operator of thebuilding (who is the VICTIM of the fire) will be more likelyto incur the blame.

The building owners are being served by outside fire de-partment and insurance industry inspection services.Because they receive these free services, the ownersnearly always believe that their protective systems andbuilding operations are SAFE in event major recommen-dations are NOT submitted. But, these inspection ser-vices are usually quite superficial, covering only such ob-vious matters as fire extinguishers, housekeeping, ob-struction of sprinkler heads, frayed wires, blocked openfire doors, etc.

That the inspections are relatively superficial is not theissue. Indeed, the housekeeping type inspections arequite valuable and reduce fire losses. What is objection-able is that the inspection agency rarely advises the own-ers as to the limitations of the inspections and the defi-ciencies of the codes. Therefore, owners believe there ismore than there is. As for the fire insurance inspectionservices, my admonition is beware the advice of he whoprofits from fire. Those who market fire protection engi-neering services too often do not actually engineer at all.Rather, they work to learn the many technicalities of thecodes and apply the codes verbatim.

There is a great need in America for the fire protectioncommunity to begin to be more honest with the public, toadvise the people as to the limitation of the inspectionservices and the true nature of the code system, which isa marketing system, and allow, indeed encourage thecreation of more sophisticated fire protection engineer-OCTOBER. MS

ing services and consumer protection services that willprotect the public from dishonest fire codes.

The ability of some to use fire codes to create closedmarket places that serve only their own special interestneeds with products that are too often geared for highprices and poor quality must be curbed.

There are thousands of small fire protection systemcontractors using a standard/code to design and marketfire Protection systems, and this is right and proper.These businessmen do not pretend to be selling anythingmore than a standard product.

These businessmen too are ill served when morepowerful special interests within the field influence thecode to make the end product less than safe. The smallcontractor, as well as the public, is then unnecessarilyendangered.

If any good comes from this fire in the Safeway ware-house, a fire that defeated the protection system almostas easily as a professional fighter could out punch aschoolgirl, may it be two fold.

First, may true engineering enter the sprinkler designfield. Second, may a higher level of honesty enter the firecode operation.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:Richard M. Patton is a Registered Professional

engineer and a licensed fire protection contractor inthe state of California.

You may communicate with him by writing: PattonFire Suppression Systems, Inc., 5316 Roseville Road,Suite P. North Highlands, CA 95660, or by calling(9161 338-0943.