"all 75 High-Rises Tested So Far Have Failed Fire Safety Regulations In England"

[vetuste_ennemi]

Reported on tonight's CNN.

All? I can think of only two plausible explanations for this.

One (the charitable version) is that today's standards are more rigorous than those applied at the time of the original build/upgrade/refurbishment.

If, however, the standards haven't changed, then I'm left with only two alternative explanations: that all the original inspectors were incompetent, or that they were all .

I invite younger, more agile and more inventive minds to suggest further explanations.

[Sqad]

TTT...OK.

[mikey4444]

TTT....while I agree with most of what you say, I am not sure about the bribery bit. In order for bribery on that scale to be effective, then an awful of of people, in a lot of different organisations would have had to be involved.

I have a feeling that the true cause of the disaster will much more complicated....a lethal combination of incompetence, confusion on various and conflicting building regs, a desire to do things "on the cheap" and yes....perhaps some dishonesty thrown in as well.

[albaqwerty]

'who do you sue?'

The people/council who said this was safe material to use and that's just for starters.
If the manufacturer displayed their product as safe to use, go after them as well.

[ToraToraTora]

fair enough mikey/sqad but I cannot fathom how flammable material fixed with wooden batten can possibly pass even the laxest regulations. BTW I'm not really concerned with who gets sued and lines the pockets of leeches, I'm concerned with prosecuting any criminal involvement in this. I mean surely you can have fire retardant cladding fixed with metal brackets for example.

[mikey4444]

Sqad....(09:15)....there is nothing whatsoever debatable about whether the cladding is inflammable or not.

Last week, CH4 News showed a clip of it being tested in a laboratory ::::::

https://www.channel4.com/news/grenfell-fire-cladding-in-14-tower-blocks-fails-fire-test

( testing starts at about 02:50 )

It ignited almost immediately, whereas a sample with mineral wool inside the sandwich didn't. Looks pretty conclusive to me !

( not sure if the Ch$ clip will work in Spain )

[mikey4444]

I am not concerned at this stage whether anyone is sued or not. There a criminal investigation going on, and that will have to be concluded before the Enquiry can start, let alone any court cases.

TTT...I am with you regarding the wooden battens bit !

[Sqad]

mikey......yes I did see that on TV, but since then there have been several experts who came to different conclusions and no, I haven't got a link.
I am sure that you are correct........but to me it is quite a task to strip of ALL cladded buildings in the UK on the evidence that we have before us.

[EDDIE51]

All the tests so far have failed, yes true. But so far only those buildings thought to be at the highest level of risk have been tested.
Fire safety testing has to be carried out by a laboratory that has been certified as competent by the British Standards Authority ( or what ever it is called now)getting that certification takes time , several months at least and needs the correct equipment which is NOT cheap! So there are not many places in the UK equipped and certified to do it. That is why the most at risk buildings have been given priority. Many more will need to be tested but they are lower risk so lower priority , testing them all will take years!

[mikey4444]

Sqad....we will agree on the quite a task bit !

This reminds me of what happened when Asbestos was first suspected of being the potentially deadly substance that it is. It was quite a struggle to get legislation through Parliament, mainly due to the activities of Cyril Smith !

[anneasquith]

Could the whole disaster be simply, take the cheapest offer/ material.?

[ToraToraTora]

there's an opportunity here to produce an attractive affordable fire retardant cladding material for all these high rises, I hope the manufacturers are beavering away now because it will be needed.

[Huderon]

It's beginning to look as though no individual company was at fault here.

The manufacturer of the aluminium panels, Arconix, makes different types of panels. Reynobond PE, which was used in the cladding for Grenfell tower, is less fire resistant than Reynobond FR and the sales literature for PE says that it should not be used for buildings higher than 10 meters.

The panels were sold to Omnis Exteriors who acted as the fabricator, adding insulation bought from Celotex to the panels, which were then installed by a third company which had won the contract from the main contractors for the refurbishment of the tower. A statement on the Omins Exteriors website says that panels like Reynobond PE should only be used with a non-combustible insulation material if they are to be used on high rise buildings.

That information comes from a piece in the Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/26/grenfell-tower-cladding-linked-to-fire-pulled-from-sale-worldwide

That all sounds like some level of incompetence on the part of all parties concerned. However when driving home last night I'm pretty sure I heard on the news that the Minister for Communities and Local Government had said something about making a change to the building regulations. Can't find a link for that statement, but if true it would imply that in this country the building regulations do not bar the use of Reynobond PE on high rise buildings.

It is possible that, as long as everything used complied with the building regulations in force at the time, no individual or company involved in this disaster is directly to blame and that in the end all the talk of prosecutions for manslaughter will come to nothing.

[mikey4444]

Eddie...alas what you say may be true. In the mean time, landlords of high-rise buildings should be doing all they can to provide as high a level of care and safety as they can.

This has been a wake-up call to us all.

[Sqad]

Eddie
"It is possible that, as long as everything used complied with the building regulations in force at the time, no individual or company involved in this disaster is directly to blame and that in the end all the talk of prosecutions for manslaughter will come to nothing"

Exactly......that is what I was trying to say in multiple posts that took you just one post to put it so eloquently.

[vulcan42]

There has to be something seriously wrong with the system of retrospectively inspections of high rise flats, yesterday I heard on the radio that some councils are now fitting fire doors. The rules and regulations state that every domestic dwelling above two levels must have fire doors fitted at every level. If they are only now fitting these doors, what authority passed these buildings as meeting the regulations and safe to live in?

[mikey4444]

Sqad......Eddie is one of our more eloquent of members, even more eloquent than you and I !

[albaqwerty]

Vulcan, it's my understanding that front doors in flats should be fire-proof, allegedly some tenants took them out and put in their own front door.

Mr Alba has worked in construction for many years and explained to me that wooden battens supporting the cladding wouldn't have caught fire.

[BAKERS DOZEN]

There is no logic to me in evacuating people from tower blocks when shopping malls, leisure centres, high rise office blocks, schools etc are all coated in the same stuff but have only been mentioned briefly on the news. I used to work on the 20th floor of an office block in Manchester, I have no idea what the building was covered in but if I worked there now I think I would be a bit concerned.

[mikey4444]

Alba....Can Mr Alba explain why wood wouldn't burn ?

[tamborine]

Insurers of cladding companies should payout.