Apartment Building, Residential, Residential High Rise Shreveport, LA – High-rise apartment blaze knocked down by sprinkler system May 20, 2015 viking210 Firefighters were called to the high-rise Fairmont Apartments building in downtown Shreveport just before 7:00 Monday evening. Fire officials say the fire appeared to have started in the kitchen of a third floor apartment. Fortunately, the sprinkler system had mostly knocked out the fire before firefighters arrived. “The sprinkler system did what it was supposed to do, save the owners of the building money, reduce the damage and minimize injuries to the occupants. So, the sprinkler system was effective in doing its job,” says Shreveport Fire Chief Fred Sanders. The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
Residential, Townhouse / Condominium Woodbridge, VA – Sprinklers contain fire in townhouse occupied by two adults and five children May 19, 2015 viking210 Two adults and five children are safe after a townhouse fire Sunday evening in Woodbridge, Va., officials said. The fire happened around 7 p.m. in the 2700 block of Corbin Court, Prince William County Fire and Rescue Department said. Crews found a kitchen fire contained by the home’s sprinkler system when they got to the home. Residents inside of the home were safely evacuated, officials added. The Red Cross is helping two adults and five children who were all displaced by the fire. Damages as of now are estimated at $10,000. Officials said the reduction in damages is due to the quick activation of the sprinkler system inside of the home. The fire remains under investigation.
Nursing Home/Senior Living, Residential, Residential High Rise Dayton, OH – 8th floor fire at senior apartment building extinguished with help from sprinkler system May 16, 2015 viking210 Crews were dispatched to the senior living facility just before 7:30 p.m. Friday on a report of a fire in an apartment of a multi-story building. The fire originated in an eighth-floor apartment at Bethany Village, The sprinkler system activated and several medic units have been requested. Washington Twp. fire Capt. Ron Kern said the fire began in the kitchen of an eighth-floor apartment, and said the cause is under investigation. He also confirmed that two residents have been displaced because of water damage that occurred from floors eight to five.The building was being evacuated as fire crews arrived, Kern said, lauding staff for its quick work in starting that process when the fire alarm was activated. He did not know how many residents and staff had to be evacuated. We’re told by a maintenance worker at the facility that there was a fire in the kitchen of an apartment on the eighth floor, but it was quickly put out by firefighters and the building sprinkler system. Only the eighth floor was evacuated, fire officials said, and two units are now inhabitable because of water damage.
Apartment Building, Residential Yakima, WA – Sprinklers credited with saving lives and property from fire at apartment building May 13, 2015 viking210 The Yakima Fire Department says a small fire at an apartment unit Tuesday night has displaced about 20 people. The fire started after someone in a third floor apartment unit on the 800 block of East D Street left a pan of oil unattended on the stove around 6 p.m. Firefighters also say although the water damage was significant, the fire sprinkler system was instrumental in saving lives and further property damage from an extensive fire. Having the sprinklers activate saved the building from severe structural damage from the fire. Water is usually easier and quicker to clean than rebuilding from fire damage. Also water is less hazardous to the occupants than smoke and fire. Without the activation of the fire sprinkler system, the lives of the people in all 18 units could have been affected.
Food Processing, Manufacturing Simpsonville, KY – Fire at Purnell Sausage factory contained by sprinkler system May 11, 2015 viking210 No one was hurt when a fire broke out at a sausage factory in Simpsonville on Saturday. Shelby County dispatchers confirmed the fire started just after 6 p.m. at their building in the 6900 block of Shelbyville Road in Simpsonville, Kentucky. Two fire departments responded to fight the flames. The fire reportedly happened in the freezer room. Employees say the sprinkler system kept the fire contained. No injuries have been reported at this time.
Manufacturing, Power / Energy Facility Buchanan, NY – Transformer fire at nuclear power plant doused with help from sprinkler system May 10, 2015 viking210 As reported by CNN … a transformer failure at the Indian Point nuclear power plant caused an explosion and fire at the facility Saturday evening, sending billows of black smoke into the air near Buchanan, New York. The fire broke out on the non-nuclear side of the plant, about 200 yards away from the reactor building, according to Entergy spokesman Jerry Nappi. “The fire is out and the plant is safe and stable,” Nappi said. Federal officials said one reactor unit automatically shut down. No one was injured in the blaze. A sprinkler system doused the fire with the help of personnel on the scene, Nappi said. There was “no threat to public safety at any time,” the facility said in a tweet. “All Indian Point emergency systems worked as designed.” Multiple emergency services agencies responded to the explosion at the plant, located approximately 50 miles north of Manhattan, including the Westchester County and New York State Police. “We saw just a huge black ball of smoke right across the river,” witness Gustavus Gricius told CNN. “We could smell the oily, electric burn smell.” Gov. Andrew Cuomo was at the plant and received a briefing on the accident. He called the incident “relatively minor” but added, “these situations we take very seriously. This is a nuclear-powered plant; it’s nothing to be trifled with.” The blast sent the facility into an emergency response situation classified as an “unusual event,” according to Nappi. The event was declared at 5:50 p.m. and the fire was out by 6:15 p.m. Neil Sheehan, a spokesman for the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said the agency had three inspectors respond. “They’re cooling down the reactor and we’ll have to investigate the cause of the fire,” he said. The facility houses two nuclear reactor units and produces approximately 25% of the electricity for New York City and Westchester County, according to its website.
Hotel / Motel, Hotel / Restaurant Reno, NV – Sprinkler system activates to help contain hotel fire May 6, 2015 viking210 An investigation is underway into a fire Tuesday night in the Ponderosa Hotel in Reno’s Midtown district. Crews responded around 8 p.m. after a fire was reported in one of rooms at the Ponderosa on South Virginia Street. (The fire sprinkler system activated and helped contain the fire to one room.) About 20 people had to be evacuated but the fire was contained to just the one room. Firefighters say they got a quick jump on the fire and were able to keep the damage to a minimum. “We were able to evacuate the people out of the floor the fire was on,” Battalion Chief Tim O’Brien said. “We were able to quickly shut down the sprinkler system once the fire was out and prevent any further water damage to the structure,” he said. The residents who had to be evacuated later were allowed to return to their rooms. As of late Tuesday, the fire’s cause had not been determined. No one was hurt.
Hotel / Motel, Hotel / Restaurant Cartersville, GA – Sprinkler system suppresses possible meth lab fire at hotel May 1, 2015 viking210 An explosion that left a bathroom door lying in the middle of a hotel room had markers of a methamphetamine lab, according to a drug official. Emergency officials responded about 8 p.m. to Cartersville North Inns & Suites, 11 Kent Drive in Cartersville, after reports of an explosion blew the door off and activated the sprinkler system. “We responded to a possible meth lab explosion. It has some signatures of a meth lab explosion, but I won’t know until we get a search warrant to be able to get into the room and isolate that,” Bartow-Cartersville Drug Task Force Commander Capt. Mark Mayton said, declining to detail the signatures present at the scene. Bartow County Fire Department Capt. Mike Kimbrel said crews responded to the third floor room to find no fire but other indicators of what may have occurred. “There was no fire. We suspect the sprinkler system suppressed it … worked like it was supposed to,” he said. “… There was an odor they encountered. Everything we were doing was just precautionary, making sure no one was contaminated, everybody was accounted for. “We’ve been told it was an explosion. … I don’t know that somebody didn’t just kick the door in. According to my crews, the door was off the hinges. I was just up there and there was a door laying in the floor of the bedroom.” Authorities conducted a partial evacuation and hotel employees on scene Wednesday night were shifting guests to other floors as necessary. “We have secured the immediate area to make sure there was no contamination to other guests that were in the building. We’ve evacuated the entire floor that this happened on,” Mayton said. The occupants of the room were not at the scene and, as of press time, were not in custody. Mayton declined to comment on their identity. While waiting for a search warrant for the room, Mayton said the investigation would determine whether the room’s occupants were indeed manufacturing meth. “It’s going to depend on what we find in there. The air is going to have to be sampled. We have to use air monitoring equipment just to make sure there’s no explosive levels of gases in there,” he said. No injuries were reported, although authorities were in contact with area hospitals for possible patients with chemical burns.
Manufacturing, Other - Manufacturing Portage, MI – Fire at Stryker Medical extinguished by sprinkler system May 1, 2015 viking210 Stryker Corp. had to be evacuated Wednesday evening after a fire broke out in one of the building’s machine shops. At 6:32 p.m. Wednesday, the Portage Fire Department responded to reports of a fire alarm activation in Stryker Medical, located at 3800 E Center Avenue in Portage, according to Portage Battalion Chief Rick Nason. Within 64 seconds, the first fire crew arrived on scene and witnessed the company’s employees evacuating the building, though “reported nothing showing on the building’s exterior,” Nason said. Inside, investigators discovered smoke billowing in one of the building’s machine rooms, located on the west side of the structure. “We responded non-emergency to the alarm and upgraded the call,” Nason said, adding three engines responded to the scene after firefighters discovered the smoke, as well as water spread by the company’s sprinkler system. “It was a big enough fire to set off the system, but it was contained,” Nason said, adding the sprinkler system extinguished the blaze. “There’s some plastic that’s burned up, next to a machine,” Nason added of the damages sustained during the fire. Firefighters worked for more than an hour clearing water and smoke from the building. No one was injured during the incident. The cause is under investigation.
Auto Dealership, Retail Eureka, CA – Sprinklers help limit damage in fire at auto body shop April 21, 2015 viking210 An alert passerby coupled with a sprinkler system helped quell what could have been a much worse fire at Fred’s Body Shop on Saturday night. A malfunctioning paint recycler — an apparatus which separates and reclaims solvents from waste paint for reuse — at the shop, located on Indianola Cutoff, was the cause of the fire but the business’ commercial fire sprinkler system suppressed much of the flames. A passerby reported smoke and a small amount of fire coming from the shop and, at about 6:40 p.m., units from the Humboldt Bay Fire and Arcata Fire headed to the scene. The first arriving battalion saw smoke coming from the roof vents and forced open a door and found the fire in the back of the shop. Additional crews arrived and extinguished the flames with 15 minutes. As a result, Indianola Cutoff was closed for about an hour and a half. Damages were estimated at $6,000 but fire officials note the early notification and fire suppression system greatly minimized the damage potential for the body shop.
