firesprinkler.tv Fire sprinkler

burst fire sprinkler pipe caused a partial ceiling collapse at a seniors’ residence.

The incident occurred about 2:30 p.m. in a vacant third-floor room at Sunrise Assisted Living, 5401 Lakeshore Rd. Residents close to where the damage occurred were moved to the lobby, said Ben Rotsma, prevention officer for the Burlington Fire Department. No injuries were reported.

Rotsma said a three-metre square portion of the ceiling collapsed in a resident’s room on the third floor after a pipe that feeds a sprinkler burst. He said some drywall came down and water leaked into the room and the main corridor. Firefighters helped staff to turn the water off.

A minor fire broke out Saturday night at the Concord plant where the Times is printed, but it was quickly contained by the sprinkler system.

Contra Costa County firefighters arrived shortly after 6 p.m. at the Times’ three-story plant on Dean Lesher Drive, west of Port Chicago Highway. No one was hurt.

The fire started in the dust collector on the third floor, Battalion Chief Kevin McCarthy said.

Plant employees smelled smoke and pulled the fire alarm, said East Bay Production Manager Werner Reuper.

The fire erupted while the press was printing the Sunday edition of The New York Times. About 30,000 copies had already been printed when the presses were stopped. Reuper said they still had another 30,000 copies to go.

At 8:30 p.m. Reuper said all of about 30 employees were back in the plant, but they were waiting for replacement sprinkler heads before they could restart the presses.

“We’ll be pushing the envelope,” he said about making the print deadline.

Crews still had to print the West County Times and the central edition of the Contra Costa Times Saturday evening. Reuper said if necessary, they would make plans to print the papers at the Walnut Creek plant.

A minor fire broke out at the same plant in November but was put out by employees with fire extinguishers. That fire started in a folder, which collects large sheets of multiple newspapers from the press webs, cuts them and folds them into individual newspapers.

Who knew Salt Lake County’s love affair with the environment would have come to this? A four-floor rain forest inside the county’s government complex.
Truth is, the county never meant for it to happen.
And staffers probably wouldn’t use the word “love” to talk about their doused documents, showered computers and doused offices.
A broken fire sprinkler on the Salt Lake County Government Center’s fourth floor soaked offices sometime early Wednesday morning. Water pooled on the top floor and then trickled through ceiling tiles into the offices below.
The leak wasn’t discovered until 6 a.m. - after the water already had reached the ground floor.
The county treasurer gave his staffers the day off. The auditor retained a skeleton crew. And the facility management folks worked overtime with Utah Disaster Kleenup to sop up the mess.
As for the damage? Associate Director of Administrative Services Patrick Leary hasn’t determined that yet, but said many computers have been sent away to dry.
At least the county can be sure of one thing:
“If there is ever a fire,” Leary said, “we know we have enough pressure in the line.”

Two recent fires, both caused by cigarettes left burning in planters, are ringing a note of alarm throughout the community and prompting local fire officials to want to get the word out about fire safety essentials.

The late night Castle Ridge fire, which destroyed an entire apartment building and left 17 local employees homeless, could have been less devastating had the project been built under more modern building codes, but it also could have been worse in terms of life safety, because none of the fire or smoke alarms in the building was triggered, said fire officials.

Less than two weeks later, on June 23, another improperly extinguished cigarette started a fire in a flower box at the Centennial affordable housing complex. Although the latter fire was extinguished before it caused any property damage or threatened any lives, it alarmed fire officials, who had hoped the widely publicized cause of the Castle Ridge fire would have been all the warning needed.

LANCASTER

IN US building codes Dry pipe systems can only be used (by regulation) in spaces in which the ambient temperature may be cold enough to freeze the water in a wet pipe system, rendering the system inoperable. Dry pipe systems are most often used in unheated buildings, in outside canopies attached to heated buildings (in which a wet pipe system would be provided), or in refrigerated coolers. Dry pipe systems are the second most common sprinkler system type.

Water is not present in the piping until the system operates. The piping is pressurized with air, at a “maintenance” pressure which is relatively low compared with the water supply pressure. To prevent the larger water supply pressure from forcing water into the piping, the design of the dry pipe valve (a specialized type of check valve) intentionally includes a larger valve clapper area exposed to the maintenance air pressure, as compared to the water pressure.

Operation - When one or more of the automatic sprinklers is exposed to sufficient heat, it opens, allowing the maintenance air to vent from that sprinkler. Each sprinkler operates individually. As the air pressure in the piping drops, the pressure differential across the dry pipe valve changes, allowing water to enter the piping system. Water flow from sprinklers needed to control the fire is delayed until the air is vented from the sprinklers. For this reason, dry pipe systems are usually not as effective as wet pipe systems in fire control during the initial stages of the fire.

Some view dry pipe sprinklers as advantageous for protection of collections and other water sensitive areas. This perceived benefit is due to a fear that a physically damaged wet pipe system will leak, while dry pipe systems will not. However, dry pipe systems will only provide a slight delay prior to water discharge while the air in the piping is released prior to the water filling the pipe.

Disadvantages of using dry pipe fire sprinkler systems include:

• Increased complexity - Dry pipe systems require additional control equipment and air pressure supply components which increases system complexity. This puts a premium on proper maintenance, as this increase in system complexity results in an inherently less reliable overall system (i.e., more single failure points) as compared to a wet pipe system.
• Higher installation and maintenance costs - The added complexity impacts the overall dry-pipe installation cost, and increases maintenance expenditure primarily due to added service labor costs.
• Lower design flexibility - Regulatory requirements limit the maximum permitted size (i.e., 750 gallons) of individual dry-pipe systems, unless additional components and design efforts are provided to limit the time from sprinkler activation to water discharge to under one minute. These limitations may increase the number of individual sprinkler systems (i.e., served from a single riser) that must be provided in the building, and impact the ability of an owner to make system additions.
• Increased fire response time - A maximum of 60 seconds is allowed by regulatory requirements from the time a sprinkler opens until water is discharged onto the fire. This delay in fire suppression results in a larger fire prior to control, producing increased content damage.
• Increased corrosion potential - Following operation or testing, dry-pipe sprinkler system piping is drained, but residual water collects in piping low spots, and moisture is also retained in the atmosphere within the piping. This moisture, coupled with the oxygen available in the compressed air in the piping, increases pipe internal wall corrosion rates, possibly eventually leading to leaks. The internal pipe wall corrosion rate in wet pipe systems is much lower, in which the piping is constantly full of water, reducing the amount of oxygen available for the corrosion process.

By a wide margin, wet pipe sprinkler systems are installed more
often than all other types of fire sprinkler systems. They also are the
most reliable, because they are simple, with the only operating
components being the automatic sprinklers and (commonly, but not
always) the automatic alarm check valve. An automatic water supply
provides water under pressure to the system piping. All of the piping
is filled with water. Until sufficient heat is applied, causing one or
more sprinklers to fuse (open), the automatic sprinklers prevent the
water from being discharged.

Operation - When an automatic sprinkler is exposed to sufficient
heat, the heat sensitive element (glass bulb or fusible link) releases,
allowing water to flow from that sprinkler. Sprinklers are manufactured
to react to a specific range of temperatures. Only sprinklers subjected
to a temperature at or above their specific temperature rating will
operate.