WOBO is pleased to bring you fire news and activities

how-digital-fire-records-are-transforming-education-hospitality-property-management

Join us for the next FSM webinar with Tio on 26 October 2023 at 10.30am, to get an insight into how digital fire records are transforming education, hospitality & property management.

FIA Lead of the Digital Records Task Group Jason Hill invites fire safety professionals from the Education, Hospitality & Property Management sectors to a discussion on how digital records are changing how compliance is documented and achieved.

We will be exploring case studies from many organisations such as the NHS, MOD, Church of England, Manchester Metropolitan University, Salvation Army, UK Atomic Energy Authority, Enterprise Rent-a-car, Caterpillar, Arsenal FC and P&O Ferries.

We will be looking at:

• The current unique challenges faced by each industry
• How trend-setting organisations are solving these with digital tools
• The 5-step playbook for digitally transforming fire safety in less than 30 days

FSi-focuses-on-benefits-of-offsite-construction

FSi to highlight offsite construction’s role in high standards of fire protection

PASSIVE FIRE protection specialist FSi is using the Offsite Expo 2023 – which runs at the CBS Arena in Coventry on 19-20 September – to highlight the benefits that offsite construction can bring in the efficient installation of cavity barriers to help protect buildings in the event of a blaze breaking out.

With the recent announcement that the UKs Government’s cladding safety scheme is to be expanded, fire protection measures continue to be a major consideration in all aspects of construction.

At the Offsite Expo, FSi is focusing on the installation of cavity barriers and how offsite construction techniques are compatible. These factors are essential to the efficient operation of an open state system wherein the cavity barriers expand to compartmentalise airflow gaps behind the façade to delay the spread of flames and smoke around the outside of a building in the event of a fire.

In the Fire Protection Masterclass at the Offsite Expo, Liam Blears (business and technical development manager for façades at FSi) will discuss how forward planning is key to ensure correct sequencing in offsite construction, and also how the controlled environment used to create the modules supports excellence in cavity barrier installation (including the ability to carry out on-site checks).

FSi has provided passive fire protection through the installation of cavity barriers in several modular buildings, including at 101 George Street, which is one of the world’s tallest modular buildings.

Record-number-of-e-bike-fires-in-London

FIREFIGHTERS IN London have tackled more e-bike and e-scooter fires so far in 2023 than they did for the whole of 2022, with e-bikes swiftly becoming the capital’s fastest-growing fire trend. By the end of August, crews had fought 104 e-bike fires along with 19 e-scooter blazes, overtaking the 116 total fires attended last year. This number is higher than in any other year in London.

Tragically, three people have lost their lives this year in fires believed to have been caused by the failure of e-bike lithium batteries, while 51 people have been injured. A coroner has now written to the Office for Product Standards and Safety asking for further safety standards to be introduced following the death of a man in an e-bike fire back in March.

e-bikes and e-scooters can catch fire incredibly quickly if their lithium batteries become damaged or begin to fail. Privately owned e-scooters remain illegal in public places and on London’s roads, but they’re not illegal to purchase.

bre-investigates-causes-and-consequences-of-lithium-ion-battery-fires-in-new-research

In collaboration with Electrical Safety First, the Building Research Establishment (BRE) fire safety research team has carried out tests into lithium-ion battery fires – the dangers of which are being increasingly well documented.

The research work involved a series of tests on lithium-ion batteries used in e-scooters and e-bikes, to understand what causes them to fail and observe what happens when they do.

The results demonstrate the explosive nature of lithium-ion battery fires, says the BRE, as a result of a process known as thermal runaway.

The tests were commissioned by Electrical Safety First, a charity campaigning to reduce deaths and injuries caused by electricity in UK homes.

The charity says it is concerned around the increasing number of incidents from such batteries. In a report published earlier this year, the charity found that fires from lithium-ion batteries in e-bikes and e-scooters had claimed four lives in the first three months of 2023

risky-business-calling-for-safe-evacuation/live

Join us for the next FSM webinar with Evac+Chair on 19 October 2023 at 10.30am, where we dive into a discussion on navigating the legal landscape of evacuation measures. 

The aim of this webinar is to bring to light the current legal landscape that surrounds evacuation measures, as well as educate organisations and the responsible persons of their liabilities, risks, and obligations when it comes to being prepared to evacuate all.

Having a suitable evacuation plan which includes a PEEP (Personal Emergency Evacuation Plan) or a GEEP (Generic Emergency Evacuation Plan) detailing the correct assistive equipment, is of paramount importance. Furthermore, ensuring everyone knows what to do in an emergency, including personnel who are trained to assist in the safe evacuation of everyone from Fire Marshalls to operators of assistive equipment, will ensure the evacuation is successful.

Warning-issued-over-building-safety-crisis

CHANCELLOR OF the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt has been warned that the Government could face a “multi-billion pound bill” to rescue up to 1.7 million potential financial victims of the post-Grenfell building safety crisis. If nothing is done, the Government could face the risk of large numbers of innocent people losing their homes and lenders facing heavy losses as leases are forfeited.

The crisis arises because the Government’s leaseholder protection legislation introduced last year, with the aim of tackling the fall-out across Britain from the Grenfell Tower fire in June 2017, does not cover three groups of people: those living in low-rise flats, those who have enfranchised and those who own more than three flats.

Unless this situation is rectified, up to 1.7 million individuals could find themselves in an impossible position until all buildings have been assessed for fire safety issues.

Not all buildings will have fire safety issues, but the entire flats market has been hit as no-one yet knows which buildings are affected. Those in buildings found to be unsafe are either left with a flat they cannot sell or otherwise forced to pay thousands – or even tens of thousands – of pounds in costs they simply cannot afford in order to remediate a range of building safety defects (including Grenfell-type external wall cladding). They may even be living in potentially dangerous flats that need to be urgently made safe.