Category Archives: Residential High Rise

Nursing Home/Senior Living, Residential, Residential High Rise

Dayton, OH – 8th floor fire at senior apartment building extinguished with help from sprinkler system

 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, Nursing Home/Senior Living, Residential, Residential High Rise

Hibbing, MN – Single sprinkler contains early morning fire at senior high rise apartment building

A fire at Hibbing’s Androy Building Sunday morning drew a full response from the Hibbing and neighboring fire departments. But when they arrived, they found the fire had already been contained by a single sprinkler head.

The Androy Building houses senior high-rise apartments, an Elks Club banquet center and an orthodontics clinic. According to the Hibbing Fire Department, firefighters arrived shortly before 6 a.m. when an automatic fire alarm was triggered. The found smoke coming from a vent near the kitchen of the Elks Club and tenants starting to to evacuate the building.

Inside, crews found smoke in the Elks side of the building but the fire down to a smolder. Crews put out the remaining smoldering material and ventilated the smoke from the banquet room. By 7:10 a.m., it was deemed safe enough to allow tenants back in.

Hibbing Fire Marshal Bryan Fagerstrom determined the case was accidental — a steam table had been left on which overheated and ignited the wood buffet table. He stressed the importance of having a properly maintained sprinkler system. “The sprinkler system in this fire was serviced and maintained per code and did exactly as it should by containing the fire and keeping it from spreading,” he said in the release.

Residential, Residential High Rise

Hamilton, ON, Canada – Fire in garbage chute at high rise apartment building extinguished by sprinklers

Residents were evacuated from a downtown apartment building for about half-an-hour Monday to allow Hamilton firefighters to deal with a fire in the garbage chute.

Firefighters were called to 150 Sanford Avenue North shortly after 8:30 p.m. Monday.  Fire department spokesperson Claudio Mostacci said by the time firefighters had arrived, the sprinkler system had extinguished the fire.

 The service sent 11 vehicles to the scene. Some firefighters remained on the scene to deal with possible “hot spots” in the garbage.  Mostacci said no one was hurt and there was no damage.

While he could not say what caused the fire, Mostacci said the fires are often started by people accidentally throwing cigarette ashes down the chute.  He reminds tenants in apartment buildings to be careful.

Apartment Building, Residential, Residential High Rise

Redington Shores, FL – Fire at high-rise condo building extinguished by single sprinkler

Firefighters responded to the 2-alarm structure fire at 8:06 a.m. Tuesday at the Anglers Cove Condominium located at 17450 Gulf Boulevard. The firefighters discovered that there was a fire in a storage room adjacent to the condominium office that had been extinguished by the building’s sprinkler system. There were no injuries, and damage was limited to smoke and water damage to the office area. The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

Management of Anglers Cove stated that the 48 unit building was at nearly full occupancy at the time of the fire. Upon arrival Firefighters found the building being evacuated and light smoke showing from the north side of the building on the ground floor. Gulf Boulevard was shut down for about 20 minutes, and more than 200 residents had evacuated and were waiting in adjacent parking lots for the firefighters to complete their work.

“It is important to recognize the significance of this fire being controlled by the building’s sprinkler system, one single sprinkler head prevented this from being a much greater incident and prevented injuries and greater loss of property,” said City of Seminole Fire Rescue Public Education Officer Brad Dykens in a news release.

The fire had escalated to two alarms due to the special hazards that exist when dealing with a fire in a high rise building and to ensure the safety of all the residents. During the course of the evacuation one resident in a wheelchair was assisted down the stairwell by firefighters.

Units from Seminole, Pinellas Suncoast, Madeira Beach, Pinellas Park, Clearwater, and St. Petersburg fire departments responded.

Apartment Building, Residential, Residential High Rise

Columbus, OH – Kitchen fire on 9th floor of high-rise apartment building put out by sprinkler system

The fire happened around 5 a.m. in the Skyview Towers on Sawyer Boulevard, just south of I-670. According to the fire chief, the blaze started on the 9th floor, where a stovetop caught fire. The building’s sprinkler system activated and effectively put out the flames. All evacuated residents are now safe and back inside.

Residential, Residential High Rise

Chicago, IL – Fire in 24-story high rise condominium tower contained by sprinkler system

On the night of February 23, a fire was contained to a single condo unit by a fire sprinkler system on the 14th floor of the Erie on the Park high-rise in Chicago. The information was obtained through an email sent to the residents by the property manager of the 24-story, 125-unit condo building at 510 West Erie Street. The building was required by the city to install fire sprinklers when it was completed in 2002.

Tom Lia, executive director of the nonprofit Northern Illinois Fire Sprinkler Advisory Board, says that the successful fire sprinkler activation is an excellent reminder of the life-saving benefits that fire sprinklers provide in high-rises. But he also points out the glaring difference in fire protection between newer and older high-rises in Chicago.

“There are hundreds of residential high-rises in Chicago that were built before the city’s fire sprinkler requirements in 1975 that do not contain fire sprinklers,” notes Lia.

Approximately 100 of the older high-rises chose to install fire sprinklers to comply with the city’s Life Safety Evaluation (LSE) ordinance that had a deadline of January 1, 2015. That’s another 100 high-rises that will be in the “with” column for fire sprinklers, leaving less and less high-rises “without.”

Yet, the majority of the remaining high-rises chose other measures that will not fully protect residents unprotected from fires.

“As evidenced by last night’s sprinkler save, fire sprinklers are the only technology that actively control a fire and provide residents with a safe route of escape,” adds Lia. “High-rise owners, residents and prospective buyers must be mindful of the presence or absence of fire safety features, especially fire sprinklers, in their buildings.”

Residential, Residential High Rise

Silver Spring, MD – Residential high-rise fire contained by sprinkler system

A residential apartment fire at 1220 East West Highway was contained by a sprinkler system on Dec. 29 in Silver Spring.

That’s the word from Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Services Spokesperson Pete Piringer who said the fire in a 7th floor apartment of the 16-story building caused an estimated $5,000 in damage.

No one was home at the time of the fire, Piringer said.  According to Piringer, the cause of the fire was a computer overheating or electrical in nature.

Residential, Residential High Rise

Chicago, IL – (NO MEDIA COVERAGE) High-rise condominium fire controlled by sprinklers

*** No Media Coverage – Contractor Reported ***   – A grease fire on an electric stove in an interior one-bedroom condo on the 23rd floor started on Saturday evening (12/20/14).  The owner attempted to extinguish it with a towel, but it didn’t work.  A sprinkler operated and controlled the fire. The building is located at 1629 S Prairie in downtown Chicago ( Adler Place, formerly called 1600 Museum Park)

Residential, Residential High Rise

Kitchen fire at senior high-rise apartment building suppressed with help from sprinkler system (Owensboro, KY)

The call that every Owensboro firefighter fears came in at 12:07 a.m. Saturday: A fire on the 16th floor of Roosevelt House I, 2920 Yale Place.  “It was a kitchen fire,” Chief Steve Mitchell said later Saturday. “The sprinkler system had been activated, and we were able to knock the fire down fairly quickly.”  But more than 200 senior citizens live in the 18-story building, Owensboro’s tallest, and the 911 system was flooded with calls from people needing help evacuating the building, Mitchell said.  There were no serious injuries.

Residential, Residential High Rise

High rise apartment fire put out by sprinkler system (Hinsdale, IL)

Fire sprinklers helped to save residents of a 17-story apartment building from injury on Tuesday evening. A fire began in the kitchen of one of the residences on the sixth floor, and the occupants escaped without injury. Several surrounding fire crews responded to the fire to find that a single fire sprinkler had put out the fire.