THE PATTON PLAN TO ELIMINATE BUILDING FIRE DEATHS

During my lifetime I have dramatically revised fire technology while promoting the idea that engineering and science should be the key ingredients in our fire safety program. Beginning during 1896 the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) was created by the fire insurers. The fire insurers profited from fire and therefore the elimination of fire would also eliminate to a large degree the insurers. So they created the NFPA to create codes that were guaranteed to maintain a high burn rate in America. The first code created was a sprinkler code that set the regulations so rigid and so costly as to prevent the installation of sprinklers in any buildings except the very large and high valued industrial properties. These type properties could create catastrophic losses, losses too large for the insurance system. It was like a casino setting a limit on the bet so as to not allow a payout so large as to bankrupt the casino.

Because the sprinkler system was able to be designed and monitored to prevent the development of large and deadly fires 99.9 percent of the time the insurers (and the NFPA) prevented the installation of this protection within near 100 percent of those buildings (including homes) where human life was most at risk. Thus, near 100 percent of the fire deaths in America over many decades has been the result of corruption within the fire regulatory field. I developed practical and affordable fire sprinkler systems that could be economically installed in all new construction with a net reduction in cost (sprinklers allow construction cost savings) and reductions in insurance and taxes over the life of the building. The primary reason why the insurers prevented sprinklers from being installed in nearly all buildings was because,, over the life of the building an enormous amount of added premiums (insurance income) would be certain.

Whereas I created a sprinkler system (Patton Residential Life Safety System) that could be retrofitted even into existing homes economically, I also realized that many existing homes that were built devoid of sprinklers might never be retrofitted. However, I created the first ever NFPA residential fire detection code for homes in 1966. The primary reason why fire deaths occur is because the occupants do not become aware of the fire until the fire has grown to a potentially deadly level. The code I created and was able to get adopted as an NFPA code (before the NFPA fully realized I was a danger to the profit making system that required fires) would have alerted the occupants to the early fire with almost absolute certainty. So, after I got the standard passed against great opposition from the insurers, the NFPA gutted the standard and helped dishonest manufacturers sell phony smoke detectors into about 90 million homes. Yes, the NFPA, with insurance industry support, made sure that neither sprinklers nor reliable fire detectors would be installed in homes.

So, when I claim that the fire death rate within the United States could be reduced to a tiny fraction of the present day rate, this is not just pie in the sky dreaming. The technology to near 100 percent eliminate fire deaths is available and proven. The plan I have is to step by step prove that the primary cause of nearly all fire deaths in deliberate dishonesty and profit making within the organizations that the people trust to protect them. No magic wand is needed to correct the burn rate. What is needed is for the people who are at risk to know the reasons why fire is so often deadly. I have records of 50 years of creating solutions to the fire problem and 50 years of proofs of the corruption within the regulatory system. I will be proving that fire deaths are an easy problem to solve technologically. Politically is another matter. But I will provide the basic

information to set in motion corrective operations. Indeed, the corrective operation relative the phony smoke detector is already well advanced. That is why I believe that a program to correct all (or most) of the fire regulatory corruption is feasible.

Lies will always “out”. That is a historic reality. The liars can fool the people for a long time, but not forever. The NFPA code system is largely built on lies that date back to the early 20th century and before. But I have personally defeated many of the lies with almost no support and enormous opposition. Now that the corruption behind the smoke detector fraud is being revealed the public is slowly awakening to the truths I am providing. It is the people who will eventually make the lies disappear. Oh sure, there is an army of “fire experts” who profit from fire and will do all they can to prevent change and corrections. But that has been true relative all important endeavors. But change does occur and decentcy eventually overcomes the dishonesty. The NFPA has caused perhaps a half million fire casualties since it was created to keep the fires burning. In doing so the NFPA left a trail of corruption. History will eventually defeat the ghouls who burn the babies to profit from fire.

Richard M. Patton6,7,2011