Tower block fire - london

Obviously speculation on my part but with the apparent electrical surges and the cause maybe a fridge 'exploding', its probably not much of a stretch to link the too...

Regardless there are going to be lots of questions raised by this, a huge inquiry and hopefully an improved standard in ALL rented accomodations. People shouldnt have to live in such conditions in this day and age especially in a developed country. Sad times. :(
 
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Grenfell Tower residents warned "only a catastrophic event" would improve living conditions.
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How on earth can these people put money on a life...I really hope someone gets what's coming to them. Total ignorance!

The first fire crews were on the scene in under six minutes when the emergency calls began coming in at 00:54 BST.
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Now that is impressive!
 
iamtheoneneo said:
The videos on the ******* fire burning up the entire building is pretty good evidence as is the tens of blog posts by residents complaining that the building was not fit for purpose in the event of a fire.

but nahhhhh none of that is relevant of course.
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Listen to the chap (Graham) talking on BBC news right now. 11.40am onwards. Speaks a lot of sense and explains all possibilities.

There are dozens of entities who work to make a building stand up/operate. My point is you cannot say who/what is to blame yet; it usually is a combination of things going wrong, and multiple parties at fault.
 
LOAM said:
Its irrelevant to cite occurrences in other countries as the regulations that would need to be adhered to could be vastly different (there may not even be any at all). If it was Europe then its more relevant as we have a more or less level standard but even then there are variants. As Jim Mcloughlin (technical fire officer) just said on Sky though, our regs don't really cover this element of construction enough and its been used more and more.
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CDM regs are blind with respect to the origin of pertinant information, that could have been taken into account at the design stage.
 
adolf hamster said:
it's certainly very damning of the management company, i mean daily electricity surges is ridiculous, in my entire life i can recall only one actual power surge and it sure as hell wasnt bad enough to blow up any electrical equipment.
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Have you read the blog from 2013? Residents were saying smoke was coming from lights and appliances...

Apparently ministers sat on reports of how dangerous it was for years....

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/theresa-mays-chief-staff-sat-10620357
 
Chris Wilson said:
I am amazed there haven't been more of these high rise infernos, packing people above one another for umpteen floors, with each group of people having their own cooker and electronic gizmos, in some areas with a lot of people often living a lifestyle where alcohol and drugs make them careless. It's remarkable that this is the first big blaze in a high rise for ages in the UK. One has to hope that most have had a remarkable escape. I believe it would be financially impractical to build such towers in a way that fire could not spread at all, it's a risk brought on by having to house excess population density in major conurbations.

Ahh jsmoke beat me to it and more succinctly too....
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Well the reason that there hasn't been more of them is because we have pretty robust Building Regulations in the UK to prevent just that happening. The level of detail you have to undertake which includes travel distances, compartmentation of occupancy, voids and ducts etc is very high. But for the most part it focuses on the internal aspect of the building whilst external regulations deals more with how you prevent it spreading to adjacent buildings. Its possible to design these things so that they can withstand prolonged exposure to flames and regs state that escape routes need to be vent-able.

Its clearly not worked in this case though.
 
DavidMarq said:
CDM regs are blind with respect to the origin of pertinant information, that could have been taken into account at the design stage.
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but would it have been deemed reasonable to have explored the construction methods and standards of other incidents in other countries, at design stage? I would say unlikely if the product manufacturer information and the regulations of the country you are working in say its acceptable.

Revisions in red
 
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LOAM said:
but would it have been deemed reasonable to have explored the construction methods and standards of other incidents at design stage? I would say likely if the product manufacturer information and the regulations of the country you are working in say its acceptable.
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Thats not a question for me but could be a question for the courts to decide. ;)
 
DavidMarq said:
Thats not a question for me but could be a question for the courts to decide. ;)
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What is your background? I'm working with CDM daily from a designers perspective. The point being it would be unreasonable to be expected to take into account something that you have no way of establishing if you are comparing like for like. For example just focusing on one tiny aspect of the material choice, what are the fixing standards of the UE with regards external cladding systems? If they aren't exactly the same as the UK then the entire comparison is worthless.

The fact is that in the UK when this sort of thing happens, regulations are revised accordingly. But it obviously takes time.
 
Listening to first hand accounts on LBC is tough - sounds utterly horrific, our emergency services really do a fantastic job.

Hearing about people still being alive is nothing short of a miracle looking at the photos.
 
LOAM said:
What is your background? I'm working with CDM daily from a designers perspective. The point being it would be unreasonable to be expected to take into account something that you have no way of establishing if you are comparing like for like. For example just focusing on one tiny aspect of the material choice, what are the fixing standards of the UE with regards external cladding systems? If they aren't exactly the same as the UK then the entire comparison is worthless.

The fact is that in the UK when this sort of thing happens, regulations are revised accordingly. But it obviously takes time.
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But if the government already had such regulations being talked about due to complaints in this specific building (then summarily ignored for years, probably costed too much), then that's criminal negligence surely?

Hopefully Barwell gets tossed into a jail cell.
 
StriderX said:
But if the government already had such regulations being talked about due to complaints in this specific building (then summarily ignored for years, probably costed too much), then that's criminal negligence surely?

Hopefully Barwell gets tossed into a jail cell.
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Who knows, but it wouldn't effect your responsibility under CDM because its unreleased information.
 
LOAM said:
What is your background? I'm working with CDM daily from a designers perspective. The point being it would be unreasonable to be expected to take into account something that you have no way of establishing if you are comparing like for like. For example just focusing on one tiny aspect of the material choice, what are the fixing standards of the UE with regards external cladding systems? If they aren't exactly the same as the UK then the entire comparison is worthless.

The fact is that in the UK when this sort of thing happens, regulations are revised accordingly. But it obviously takes time.
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I deal with CDM as a manager on large construction projects.

What you have to keep in mind with the CDM regs is that they were designed with the view to allow for successful procecutions of those higher up the food chain. The scope is almost without limit if you can be shown to have the blame token. Also as they are prosecuted by the HSE in many cases it is on the basis that you are guilty unless proven innocent. "Foreseeable risk" for example is such a catch all that defending against it could be very difficult.

I am very weary of the power of CDM.
 
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