Towering Inferno !

Those television news pictures of a west London tower block of units enveloped in fire will strike a chill in the hearts of all people forced to replace their dream of a nice suburban home on its own block of land - with an apartment high in the sky.   The ever increasing cost of land has made the " vertical village " an inevitability.

Some years ago we sat in our movie seats and watched a Hollywood movie of just such a scenario. It was all " special effects " of course and we were assured that modern building design made such a fire an impossibility.  Multi floor buildings are made of concrete - and concrete does not burn.

No doubt the coroners inquest on that London fire will be revealing.   It seems that the fire started in a lower floor unit and quickly progressed from floor to floor, leaping up the outside of the tower block and trapping the residents of the one hundred and twenty apartments when dense smoke made the fire stairs impassable.

This was not a part of London built in the time of Charles Dickens.  This was a modern, 1970's era building which was supposed to contain fire suppressing features to stop such a conflagration.  Rescue attempts by the authorities are restricted to ladder limitations carried by fire trucks and there is a distinct limit on the reach of fire hoses.   In this London fire, flame and smoke made it impossible for helicopters to land and rescue people from the roof of the building.

Sadly, neighbours could only stand in the street and watch as this twenty-four story building burned. They could see residents at their windows, screaming for help -  and one woman dropped her baby many stories for a bystander to catch - and save.  One by one, those cries for help became mute as the fire progressed, and images at windows disappeared.

Once again the universal instruction to " wait for rescue " in a fire situation is challenged.   When the towers of the World Trade centre burned in the 9/11 attack the fire instructions had many office workers remain in their offices when escape stairs were operable.  Many people lived simply because they ignored that instruction and filed out of the building before the collapse.

If nothing else, this tragedy should be the wakeup call for every high rise to get a thorough safety check to see if whatever allowed that fire to move from floor to floor - and specially why it was enabled to progress up the outside of the building facade - is not present in other parts of the world.

This fire in London is a clear warning.  If fire safety defects are not checked and remedied, then the fire safety we rely on in multi storey buildings is a myth.  That " Towering Inferno " scenario can become a reality !