Our structural collapse injury attorneys point out that over the past couple of decades, some controversy has been simmering over the dangers posed by modern light construction methods when a fire breaks out. Until fairly recently in time, all construction relied on heavy materials like solid masonry, brick, timber, metal, and concrete. In a fire, the heavy nature of these materials would retard the spread of flames, allowing building occupants more time to flee and firefighters more time to control and contain the blaze.
In recent decades, builders have eschewed the old, reliable heavy materials in favor of lighter and cheaper materials like drywall, stucco, brick, veneer, and wood framing rather than the more solid forms of the past.
A recent 5-alarm fire on Wednesday in the Lindell apartment building in St. Louis has again highlighted the terms of the debate over modern construction methods. Less than an hour after responding to the apartment fire, which appears to have started above a top floor unit, firefighters had to quickly evacuate the building because the top floor was already giving way to collapse. Our structural collapse injury attorneys mention that the firefighters expressed concern at the overly rapid spread of the fire and felt that it was moving too quickly to engulf the attic.
The fire chief’s initial reaction was that there were no fire walls or other barriers in the attic to retard the spread of the flames and that the use of lightweight, inexpensive construction materials had helped exacerbate the blaze. But it turns out that the new Lindell residential complex was in fact built to code.
But the lightweight “draft stops” permitted by code in the attic proved ineffective in containing the spread of the fire. And between the draft stops stood numerous wooden joists, plywood, and other combustible materials that actually fed the blaze.
The St. Louis municipal code follows national building code standards. And those standards provide for lightweight draft stops and inexpensive construction materials in lieu of the more traditional firewalls, so long as the building is provided with sprinklers and electronic smoke and fire detection devices that are also up to code.
In the old days, our structural collapse injury attorneys emphasize that the slower spread of a fire due to the interference provided by solid construction materials might provide building occupants with 15 to 17 minutes in which to react and escape the building. Now, an electronic warning goes off, sometimes followed by sprinkler, but occupants and residents have to react very fast to that warning.
Occupants might only have about 3 to seven minutes in which to escape the building before deadly fire-related structural collapses begin to occur. That super quick reaction and escape window can be a challenge if, for instance, you’re a resident of the 6th floor that was asleep when the alarm went off.
Fire chiefs and fire marshals across the nation remain concerned about the reduced window that people have to escape and effectively battle a fire. The concern is not just for building occupants, but also for the firefighters who must risk their lives inside the flimsy structures trying to contain a blaze. Fire-related structural collapse remains the top cause of death among firefighters on the job.
Learn more about the danger of structural collapse and deadly entrapments from rapidly spreading fires in this article by our concerned structural collapse injury attorneys.