Hotel fires represent a major risk to people’s safety, the hotel property and business continuity.
Fire incidents not only result in financial losses, but they can also severely damage a hotel’s reputation.
The main causes of fire outbreaks
in general areas are the following:
• Malfunctions in electrical
equipment (e.g., electrical distribution systems, motors, transformers,
ventilators, electrical heaters and lighting systems) leading to
short circuits, overloads, discharges, etc.
•
Maintenance work such as welding or soldering.
•
Carelessness such as negligence in turning off electrical equipment, use
of combustible materials and liquids (cleaning, painting, etc.), and smoking.
• Temporary decorations for festivities and
functions.
• Spontaneous combustion of cleaning rags,
cotton waste, etc.
• Arson and sabotage acts also remain a very
serious fire risk. The main causes of fire outbreaks in guest rooms are the
following:
• Smoking, especially in bed and under the
influence of alcohol and/or drugs.
• Use
of faulty electrical equipment, such as electric blankets, kettles, cookers,
irons, razors, heaters, hair driers and radios, which are possibly not suited
to the hotel`s outlets and voltage.
• Carelessness with electrical equipment,
especially negligence in turning off equipment at night or when leaving the
room.
Organizational measures
The advantage of many hotels is
that they can summon professional help
relatively quickly in emergency
situations. Despite this fact, all hotels should aim
at achieving a high level of
competence in dealing with emergencies and in
recognizing potential sources of
danger, independent of outside assistance.
Organizational measures
include:
• Staff training (prevention and
intervention).
• Provision of alarm and emergency
plans.
• Periodic maintenance and
checking of fire-fighting equipment.
• Keeping escape routes accessible
and unobstructed.
• Use of fire-resistant
decorations, furniture and furnishings.
Detection measures
The main tasks of an automated
fire protection system are to detect (an incipient stage) fire, sound an
acoustic alarm, notify the fire service and activate the pre- programmed
control functions. Such a system consists of a control unit with peripheral input
devices (such as manual call points and automatic fire
detectors), output devices (such
as sounders and beacons) and output contacts to control other systems (such as
smoke control systems, HVAC systems, elevators, automated extinguishing
systems, etc.).
To minimize the danger to life and
the damage to property, it is important to detect a fire as early as possible.
Optimal product selection combined with the appropriate knowledge make it
possible to design a fire detection system capable of detecting a fire
extremely early and virtually eliminate any danger of false alarms.
Alarm and evacuation measures
When a fire breaks out prompt
warning is essential, and buildings must be evacuated within minutes to protect
people’s lives. Buildings with large numbers of occupants, such as hotels, therefore,
have special requirements regarding alarming and evacuation.
The purpose of a (acoustic) fire
alarm is to warn people of the potential hazard. In the case of a hotel three distinct
target groups are addressed:
•
Hotel guests for whom a
hazardous situation has been detected.
• Hotel staff who should coordinate the
evacuation.
• The people who should deal with the fire.
In a basic installation the fire
detection system must activate the installed alarm devices and transmit the
alarm signal to the fire department.
More sophisticated installations
may include a dedicated voice alarm system, which can be instrumental in
preventing panic by providing clear information about the danger and any
required evacuation procedures through calm and concise announcements.
In addition to the type of alarm
and evacuation system provided, evacuation plans, escape route identifications,
emergency lighting systems and smoke venting systems are essential to ensure a
fast and safe evacuation of all persons.
Each hotel must have a detailed
evacuation plan with detailed procedures for the systematic, safe, and orderly
evacuation of the building in case of fire or other emergencies. Fire drills
should be carried out on a regular basis to ensure that all members of staff
are familiar with all aspects of this plan.
If an evacuation of the building
becomes necessary, hotel guests, who will normally have little knowledge of the
building, must be able to rely on the escape route identification notices to
find their way out of the building.
To enable a safe evacuation, the
emergency lighting must be turned on in all relevant areas.
Air handling systems remove smoke
from a building allowing the escape routes
to be kept clear of smoke which is
essential to enable people to leave the hotel in a quick and safe manner.
Intervention measures
To limit the danger to human life
and the extent of the damage, it is extremely
important to start intervention
and firefighting measures as soon as possible
after the outbreak of fire. All
firefighting equipment must always be kept in
perfect working order: this is a
prerequisite for any successful intervention.
Intervention measures activated by
the fire control panel include:
• Automatic closing of fire doors
etc.
• Activation of smoke handling
systems.
• Automatic alarm transmission to
the fire department.
Important firefighting systems
include:
• Portable fire extinguishing
equipment.
• Hose reel equipment.
• Self-actuated sprinkler systems.
• Dedicated extinguishing systems
for high-risk areas.
Elements of the fire detection
system
Periphery
Fire-related information is collected from all parts of the
building by the input periphery (automatic detectors, manual call points and
input contacts) and transmitted to the control unit. The intelligent, automatic
fire detectors detect and analyze the different fire phenomena and
automatically report the current hazard levels to the control unit. When
selecting the correct fire detector for each location (together with its
settings and placement), it is also crucial to consider the type of fire to be
expected, the room height, ambient conditions such as air changes and possible
deceptive phenomena. Manual call points enable direct alarm activation by
people who recognize an incipient stage fire or smoke in their vicinity.
Contacts (e.g., from the activation of a sprinkler extinguishing system) report
a fire alarm indirectly.
Control unit
The system is monitored, controlled and operated by the fire
detection control unit, which evaluates the hazard messages from the peripheral
devices and activates audible alarm warnings and fire control installations.
Actions
The actions initiated by the control unit include alarming,
activating the fire controls and alerting the fire brigade. Optical and
acoustic alarm devices warn the people in the building. The activation of the
preprogrammed fire controls causes fire doors to be closed, and smoke and heat
extraction systems to be activated, in certain cases extinguishing systems may
also be activated
Guest Rooms
Typically, the greatest proportion
of a hotel’s floor area is occupied by the guest rooms themselves. These are
also the least controllable areas since guests cannot be included in the organizational
fire protection measures. The large variety of ignition sources, such as
overheated electrical devices (fridge, TV) or careless handling of smoking
products or candles put hotel guests in great danger, especially when fire
starts during the night.
The fire detection system needs to
warn people in the guest rooms before a dangerous situation has time to develop
due to hazardous smoke. In addition,
unnecessary alarming, triggered by steam or cigarette smoke, must be prevented.
Depending on the room dimensions a smoke detector or a multi-sensor fire
detector with the combination smoke/heat is recommended for monitoring guest
rooms.
Kitchens
Large cooking vessels, frying pans
and especially deep fryers, present a very serious fire hazard in hotel kitchens.
This is mainly due to the strong possibility of fire breaking out due to
overheating as well as the local high fire load.
Multi-sensor fire detector with
the combination smoke/heat and a sophisticated signal processing are
recommended for monitoring these areas. Avoiding unwanted alarms due to the
inevitable presence of deceptive phenomena, such as fumes or steam, requires
in-depth knowledge and experience in positioning the detectors in such
applications.
Laundries
These areas must be considered as
relatively critical zones in a hotel.
Firstly, they may have a very high fire load (e.g., amount of dirty
linen) and secondly, they provide a high risk due to the possibility of
overheated electrical installations.
Due to the many deceptive
phenomena in such an environment, like steam or dust, fire detectors are recommended which
guarantee an early alarm in case of fire and at the same time offer a high robustness against
deceptive phenomena.
Restaurants
These areas must be considered as
relatively critical zones in a hotel, due to the variety of ignition sources
such as candles or cooking and frying at the table and the number of guests in
the room.
Depending on the room dimensions
and the expected deceptive phenomena smoke detectors or multi-sensor fire
detectors with the combination smoke/heat are recommended for monitoring
restaurant areas.
Stairways
Because elevators must not be used
in case of fire, staircases play an important role as the primary escape routes
in hotel buildings.
As a rule, a single smoke detector
should not monitor more than three floors on a staircase and one detector is
required on the top floor ceiling. In addition, several manual call points must
be placed throughout the escape route.
Parking garages
A fire in an enclosed garage can
very quickly create a dangerous situation for all people in that area. Due to the significant fire load of the
parked cars, a fire which is not detected and suppressed early, can develop
into a fire
that will be very difficult to
extinguish and may threaten the stability of the building.
Deceptive phenomena such as
exhaust emissions and the harsh environmental conditions not only affect early
and reliable fire detection but also affect the service life of ordinary fire
detectors. For this reason, only fire detectors which respond appropriately to
such deceptive phenomena, and which were developed especially for harsh
environments are installed in parking garages.
Plant rooms, in which power
supply, control systems, security systems and IT infrastructure are accommodated, are risk areas that need to
be especially protected. This applies particularly to fire safety in these areas.
Aspirating smoke detection systems
(ASD) can detect even the smallest aerosol concentrations. They can detect
extremely low smoke concentrations which may be caused, for example, by a
malfunction of an electrical or electronic component. It is possible to prevent
fire developing simply by removing the power from the unit.
