Buildings undergoing restoration often pose hidden dangers
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There is a national mania for restoring old dumps. The New York City tenement building shown below was constructed by a speculative builder many years ago. The photo, taken during restoration, shows the front wall removed and bricks stored on the floor, possibly for use in the rebuilt wall. The bricks are an “undesigned” live load on the floor (see “Building Construction for the Fire Service, Third Edition,” p. 16, for definitions of loads).
Buildings like this should be classified as “defensive on arrival” (DOA). The floor beam under the bricks shows a long horizontal crack, which weakens the beam. Do not add any load — personnel or equipment — to defective beams.
When called to an incident at a building undergoing restoration, pay attention to how the work is done. An officer with the Fire Department City of New York (FDNY) responded to a gas emergency at a building in the midst of restoration, and noted that workers were replacing the previous 3 x 10 floor beams with fire-vulnerable wooden I-beams. He filed a Critical Information Dispatch System (CIDS) report on the hazard.
However, CIDS information is filed by address and announced on dispatch. In this case, when fire later broke out at the building, it was reported “at a building near X St. and Y Ave.”; because the exact address was not reported, dispatch did not report the CIDS information. As the first-due engine stretched a line into the building, the officer (who happened to be the same officer who reported the fire-vulnerable I-beams) withdrew his company and notified the incident commander (IC). The IC then ordered crews to switch to defensive mode. After a few minutes, the floor collapsed due to a heavy undesigned load of gypsum board. Command officers agreed the situation would have been very serious had the officer not recognized the hazard.
In this case, filing fire hazard information by address at alarm headquarters proved ineffective, because the person reporting the fire gave no address. Firefighters arriving on scene could have accessed such information by reporting the address to headquarters, but by the time they did, it might have been too late.
To avoid the traps of buildings under restoration, remain alert to your surroundings. For instance, a stack of wooden I-beams or even a cut-off piece of the building on site should cause concern.
Francis (Frank) L. Brannigan, a fireground commander in the 1940s and a fellow of the Society of Fire Protection Engineers, was named one of the 20 most influential people in the fire service by Fire Chief Magazine. For 37 years, Brannigan has defined building hazards for firefighters. His book, “Building Construction for the Fire Service, Third Edition,” is available from the NFPA.