Grenfell Tower

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GUEST OBSERVER
As the saying goes: 
<ul>
<li>there are the things that you know; </li>
<li>the things that you know that you don’t know (the known unknown); and </li>
<li>the things that you don’t know that you don’t know (the unknown unknown). </li>
</ul>
The recent Grenfell Tower fire tragedy in London highlights the potential catastrophic consequences of failing to find out the unknown unknown things and/or failing to take action to appropriately deal with the necessary things once known, such as the condition and performance standards of the materials in the building along with the necessary maintenance obligations of the body corporate.
There has been considerable media attention around the widespread existence of non-conforming building materials and potential devastating ramifications for bodies corporate. This article is aimed at the practical and proactive steps which bodies corporate can take to empower themselves and protect their lot owners and residents.
It is certainly true that the effective maintenance of strata title buildings is a complex affair. The contracts for the construction of the buildings on scheme land are entered into between the developer and the builder, long before the lot owners are ever in the picture. This means that; the lot owners have no input into the selection of materials or the standards of construction, and they are often unaware of the location of essential documents for the proper administration of their schemes, including construction contracts, plans and specifications.
This means that the body corporate and lot owners inherit the building with often unknown building materials; unknown latent conditions and they are unaware of the maintenance requirements for their particular building. This also has a direct effect on effectively budgeting for the future expenditure to properly maintain the building in order to maximise its effective lifespan.
Add to this the fact that there is a high amount of change within bodies corporate, which exacerbates the difficulty in managing vital information about the building. Lot owners sell, body corporate managers can change from year to year, resident managers can sell their management rights and committees often change each year. What this means is that the collective knowledge of all of the people who have been involved in the building is rarely centralised and as a result, key information and documentation is often misplaced along the way or is never obtained in the first place.
We recommend that bodies corporate take control of their information and documentation by implementing a building management document or plan. By the committee working in with the body corporate manager to create a bespoke plan for the operation and management of their building, bodies corporate will be able to identify what they know, what are the known unknown things about the building, and what unknown unknown things about their building (which are generally discovered by expert reports and professional advice). Additionally, this information is to be documented and centralised so that the body corporate does not lose this information as lot owners, body corporate managers, resident managers and committees change over time.
As part of the process of creating the building management plan, it is essential for bodies corporate to know the current (point-in-time) status of their building and documentation. For this reason, we highly recommend engagement of an expert, or team of experts, to enable the body corporate to “catch up” on the history of their building by obtaining all necessary documentation and obtain a status report as to the condition of their building as at today. This information and documentation can then be included in the building management plan and future obligations and expenditure for the building can be informed by this information. Additionally, all new occurrences at the building can be recorded in the building management plan as time goes on so that committees have the information which the need to effectively act on behalf of the body corporate to make decisions within their authority and to properly inform the lot owners in order for them to make effective decisions at general meetings.
Building condition and maintenance is only one of the many things which we recommend is included in an effective building management plan. If bodies corporate know what they know, know what they don’t know, and find out the unknown unknown things, then they are in a much greater position to plan for and make effective decisions on all matters which can have an effect on their building.
Hopefully, such an approach can enable bodies corporate to minimise or prevent financial and physical disasters.
James Nickless is partner of <a href="https://www.clarkekann.com.au/newsroom/combustible-cladding-audit?utm_source=Mondaq&amp;utm_medium=syndication&amp;utm_campaign=View-Original" target="_blank">ClarkeKann Lawyers</a>. 
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j.ballantyne1990-6AQqhLzZaK

Combustible cladding is just one of many essential building owners issues: CK Lawyers

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London’s Grenfell Tower fire has prompted the Victorian government to set up a the taskforce to speed up the investigation into how widely flammable cladding has been used on high-rise buildings in the state.
The Victorian Cladding Taskforce will be jointly chaired by former premier Ted Baillieu, who is also an architect, and former deputy premier and minister for planning, John Thwaites, according to the Real Estate Conversation.
The taskforce will comprise of representatives from Worksafe Victoria, the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, the Victorian Building Authority, the Municipal Association of Victoria and Emergency Management Victoria.
Leading strata management body Strata Community Australia (Vic) has welcomed the government move.
But it said in a media release that flammable aluminium cladding was just the ‘tip of the iceberg’ and the taskforce’s terms of reference must be widened to address unsafe glass panels, and other materials risking lives. 
The Grenfell Tower fire in June killed more than 80 people, and stoked up the <a href="https://www.urban.com.au/expert-insights/71811-london-apartment-tower-fire-and-possible-issues-in-australia" target="_blank">fire safety issue</a> around high-rises, both in England and in Australia. 
British audits have revealed 120 high-rise buildings use cladding and insulation similar to that installed at the Grenfell Tower.
In 2014, aluminium composite cladding, similar to that used on the Grenfell tower, was found to have contributed to the spread of a fire at the Lacrosse building in Melbourne's Docklands.
Strata Community Australia had earlier expressed concerns that hundreds of apartment and unit complexes in Victoria may be underinsured.
“The underinsurance of apartments and units could be catastrophic, potentially resulting in millions lost for property owners,” it said.
Commenting on the taskforce, Victorian Minister for Planning Richard Wynne said: "We’re bringing together the key agencies to better detect and address the issue of materials used in a non-compliant way.”
A separate stakeholder reference group, including the building unions, the Master Builders Association of Victoria, and the Housing Industry Association, will also be created, the Real Estate Conversation reported.
The taskforce will be set the mandate of inspecting thousands of apartment blocks built in the last 12 years, but instead of inspections focusing on just one material, Strata Community Australia (Vic) is pushing for the taskforce to make these visits a ‘done once, done right’ experience. 
“The news of thousands of buildings receiving government funded inspections and testing in Victoria is excellent progress, but the building defects crisis unfortunately is not isolated to one material alone,” its general manager Rob Beck said. 
With the growing popularity of glass panel facades and cladding, the threat of substandard products of this variety coming into the market rise too and should prompt quick action, added Beck.
“Similar to the recent Grenfell fire regarding flammable aluminium cladding, we must not wait until a glass panel explodes on a couple sitting on their balcony, or falls to the street below crashing down onto pedestrians.
“There is ample information to suggest this is a problem right now, and we are eager to see these high risk materials dealt with at the same time as flammable cladding, not after.” 
He also said it was not desirable to expect Victorian property owners to bear the expense for remediation “while those causing the issues escape any penalties”.
Though there were no deaths in the Lacrosse Apartments blaze, the owners last year served a $16 million dollar bill to rectify the building, roughly sitting at $40,000 per owner, he said.
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jonathanchancellor-7SQnKwU6yx

Former Victoria premier to head taskforce on flammable cladding probe

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GUEST OBSERVER
The fire at the Grenfell Tower in London has naturally led to speculation about the causal factors and the potential for it to happen in Australia.
Understandably, some have raised questions about the role of building products and the extent to which they contributed to fire and its spread.
It is understood that authorities in London will undertake extensive inquiries into the Grenfell Tower tragedy and it is appropriate to let these run their course. As is the norm, Australian authorities will no doubt monitor these inquiries and make improvements to local laws if appropriate. A 2014 incident at the Lacrosse Tower in Melbourne caused authorities to carry out inspections on building products used in the construction of similar buildings to ensure products were fit for purpose.
The relevant laws we have in Australia are comprehensive and under almost continuous review.
Recent changes to the ABCC laws, for example, gave the Office of the Federal Safety Commissioner a bigger role in monitoring building products used in construction projects funded by the Commonwealth Government. The issue has been on the agenda for various COAG committees, including the Building Ministers Forum.
Master Builders and our members understand the importance of ensuring building products are fit for purpose and installed correctly, but there is always a risk that some products entering Australia don't meet minimum requirements.
Everyone in the building supply chain including manufacturers, importers, and wholesalers, retailers, building designers, builders and contractors have a shared responsibility to ensure building products are safe and fit for purpose.
While the focus is often on builders, greater attention should be given to those involved in importation and distribution. Making sure these products don't enter the Australian market in the first place is a position that Master Builders has made clear in submissions to government and other inquiries.
Denita Wawn is a CEO of <a href="https://www.masterbuilders.com.au/Home" target="_blank">Master Builders Australia.</a>
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jchancellor-FAypfDUnLy

London apartment tower fire and possible issues in Australia

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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/79518/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-advanced" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1">
GUEST OBSERVER
Despite the horror of the fire at Grenfell Tower, UK regulations for tall buildings are ahead of the curve in comparison with other countries.
There have been huge improvements in construction materials and technological solutions throughout the modern era. And testing and certification methods have became even more rigorous, to ensure the quality of new products.
Of course, many people are now asking what more could have been done to prevent the tragic loss of life in the Grenfell blaze. The truth is, while architects and engineers can work to mitigate the risk of fire, it cannot be completely eliminated. The addition of some materials to buildings, such as cladding, will obviously now come under scrutiny. But there are several improvements that can be made to old 20th-century tower blocks like Grenfell, to make them safer places to live.
When it comes to managing the risk of fire, builders and architects are guided by three simple principles: prevent risk, evacuate users and minimise damage – in that order. But updating or “retrofitting” older buildings to meet modern safety standards isn’t always straightforward. That’s why architects, builders and other experts work alongside fire engineers to ensure evacuation systems are adequate for the building’s structure, function and users.
There is no single formula. Each building is studied in detail by a design team, which works together to decide what approach is best. It’s important to consider how the building is being used; for instance, while offices are at risk because they contain large amounts of flammable stationary and electronic equipment, in residential units the biggest risks arise from cooking, heaters and other domestic equipment, which can start fires.
Human factors such as forgetfulness, physical limitations and human error must also play a role in fire safety planning – especially when children or elderly people are frequent users. People are also more relaxed at home, which can lead them to lose awareness of some of the risks. People often leave pans on the hob or place heaters near curtains and other combustibles for example. A team must bear all these factors in mind, as they decide how to approach each project: smoke and heat detectors can prevent some accidents, placing sockets away from windows can also help.
Safe evacuation routes
Some buildings rely heavily on evacuation routes to keep users safe when disaster strikes. This requires sound alarm systems, fire barriers in the form of fire doors and walls, and smoke extractors. These features are especially important in historic buildings, where escape routes are narrow or intricate, and have not been designed in accordance with current building regulation standards. Wherever possible, fire stairs should be partly sealed, to prevent smoke from entering, while automatic ventilation systems can be installed, which allow smoke to escape upwards like a chimney.
Done right, this can provide a safe, smoke free escape route. But it is not always possible to achieve this standard in existing buildings, which is why users are sometimes advised to stay in their flats and steer clear of stairs and corridors where smoke can build up. Smoke inhalation is the most common cause of death in fires so residents are often advised to remain in a smoke-free zone and wait to be rescued. It appears this was the case at Grenfell Tower link to stay put.
Likewise, technical considerations can prevent the use of certain types of fire safety technology – for example, when there is no space to accommodate the installation. Installing sprinkler systems is not always feasible because they often require large tanks to store water, which are heavy and need space to allow access for maintenance.
Proper emergency access
It’s hugely important for buildings to be designed to accommodate emergency responses, by making space for fire fighters to take control of and extinguish fires, if and when they occur. Some measures affect the internal layout, such as the installation of fire-fighting lifts. Others relate to the areas surrounding the building and the provision of services. For this reason, large structures must have a water source available, to reinforce the fire brigade’s own supply.
Fire engines can only reach certain heights and cannot cover the upper floors. In new buildings, dry risers are installed, providing an empty vertical pipe which fire fighters can use to pump water up to the higher storeys. In order to function properly, these need to be regularly tested and maintained. They might not be not suitable for some retrofits, due to the lack of space.
Pavements around buildings are often required to be a specific width and strength, to take the size and weight of local fire engines. All of these design measures help fire fighters keeping us safe but they are also highly reliant on maintenance. Residents of Grenfell Tower reported obstructions to emergency access routes, in one of a series of complaints about the safety and maintenance of the building.
Measures to minimise damage
When planning for fires, the team will also try to find ways to minimise the damage to the structure. This is to avoid the risk of collapse, as well as preserve as much of the building as possible, in case it can be reused after the fire.
To do this, the design team can use new building modelling software (BIM) to predict with reasonable accuracy how quickly a fire could spread through a building. All construction materials come with a set of technical data, which designers can input into the software in order to select the most suitable technology and materials for the building.
If a material is highly combustible, then alarm systems become more relevant, while escape routes require better protection and ease of movement. When a building or refurbishment is completed, the designer hands over the key and a maintenance manual to the landlord. Maintenance manuals are very detailed, providing contact information, time schedules and guarantee documents for the upkeep of the building.
A fatal flaw
But even with all these measures in place, there’s still a one major problem: materials are tested in isolation, which means that their technical data does not take into account how they will react when used in combination with other technologies – or when there are human errors in the design or assembling process. These issues are not picked up by BIM software.
Fire can spread rapidly in the small gap between the external face of the building, and the internal walls. Thermal insulation is often placed inside this cavity, and sometimes it is part of the external cladding. Some aluminium panels are made with a rock wool insulation – these are fire resistant. But aluminium gets hot and expands very quickly, heating the insulation layer. If this layer is combustible, fire can spread at speed by travelling through the cavity – which acts as a chimney – producing vast amounts of toxic smoke.
Fire barriers can be used to create compartments within the cavity, installed horizontally and vertically between the cladding and the internal wall at critical points to delay the spread of fire. But this product has to be installed with great skill for it to work efficiently, and it’s not always possible to use it for retrofits, depending on the type and condition of the existing walls.
This explains why, despite all the design efforts, the risk of fire cannot be completely eliminated by design. What’s more, designers and managers can only predict human factors and behaviours to a certain degree. For this reason, communities and schools must work together with designers, fire brigades and building managers to help prevent fires. Meanwhile, building contractors and maintenance professionals must use these techniques to ensure that residents are properly protected from harm. 
Laura B Alvarez is architectural technologist and Urban Designer, Nottingham Trent University and author for The Conversation. <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/laura-b-alvarez-209966" target="_blank">She can be contacted here</a>.
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Grenfell fire aftermath: how 20th-century buildings can be made safer, not more dangerous

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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/79445/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-advanced" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1">
GUEST OBSERVER
In the middle of the night, while most residents were sleeping, a devastating fire started at Grenfell Tower in London.
The emergency response was rapid and robust: more than 200 firefighters attended the scene, with assistance arriving just six minutes after the first calls were made. Emergency services have confirmed that 12 people are dead. More remain missing and dozens are injured. Already, people are asking how the fire spread so rapidly and why it was so difficult for residents to escape. 
Doubtless, in time, a thorough investigation will reveal the full details of what caused the disaster. But from an engineering perspective, there are a number of factors in the design of the 24-storey tower block that may have contributed to the speed and scale of the blaze.
Most of the current guidelines across the world contain detailed design requirements for fire safety such as evacuation routes, compartmentation and structural fire design. But Grenfell Tower was built in 1974. At that time, the rules and regulations were not as clear and well-developed as they are now. 
Evacuation and compartmentation
The evacuation route is one of the most important design elements when it comes to fire safety. The route should allow occupants to escape the building as quickly as possible, while sheltering them from smoke and flames. Some tall buildings have staircases installed on the outside to prevent people from getting stuck in the corridors and provide access to fresh air while they escape. Other options include installing high-power fans inside buildings, to clear the evacuation route of smoke in the event of a fire. This feature is included in the design of Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. 
It’s clear that residents were not happy with the fire safety of the escape route from a blog posted in November 2016 and the design below would suggest there was only one set of stairs for evacuation. Investigators will need to determine what evacuation routes were available.
<a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/images/2017/06/14/Screen%20Shot%202017-06-15%20at%209.07.32%20AM.png" target="_blank">Click to enlarge</a>
<img src="https://www.urban.com.au/images/2017/06/14/Screen%20Shot%202017-06-15%20at%209.07.32%20AM.png" alt="">
Another key strategy is to correctly design fire compartments to keep the fire from spreading quickly. This entails placing barriers in the building – such as fire-resistant doors and walls – to confine the fire to a local area, or at least slow the speed at which it can spread. These compartments are designed based on the function of the buildings by architects, so residential and commercial buildings will have different compartment design strategies. 
In current design practice, some buildings even include special design measures for fires, such as refuge rooms for occupants in the higher storeys, who could have trouble escaping down stairs. There are also active fire protection methods such as using sprinklers. Though a parliamentary report following the 2009 Lakanal House fire in Camberwell, London, in which six people died, recommended that sprinkler systems be installed in tower blocks across the UK, it’s not clear that these measured were implemented in Grenfell Tower. A local residents action group also claimed that their warnings about a lack of fire safety measures “fell on deaf ears”.
Materials matter
The fire risk level of any building also depends on its structural design – that is, the capacity of its materials to resist fire. Different materials receive different fire ratings in each design. For example, steel buildings are normally required to have structural elements such as beams or columns that can stand for one to two hours with the help of fire protection material such intumescent paint, which swells up when heated to protect the material beneath. 
According to reports, the key structural components of Grenfell Tower are mostly made of concrete – a material which rates highly in terms of fire resistance. While other materials can buckle in high temperatures, concrete structures can help to prevent the collapse of a building in case of fire, as well as making it safer to use helicopters – which can dump up to 9,842 litres of water at a time – to extinguish the blaze. 
There were also reports relating to cladding added as part of an £8.7m refurbishment in 2016. The material used for the cladding was primarily aluminium, which is not fire resistant. What’s more, aluminium has high conductivity – so the cladding itself could have heated up very quickly, failing to prevent the fire from travelling through the windows and up the exterior of the block from one storey to another.
In truth, most old buildings do not conform to the latest guidelines for fire safety design, so it is imperative to update them by installing sprinklers, fire alarms and extra fire evacuation staircases. While those affected may have to wait for some time before the causes of the fire become clear and responsibility is taken, landlords and local councils can act now to help prevent another disaster of this scale from happening again.
Feng Fu is lecturer in Structural Engineering, City, University of London and author for The Conversation. He can be contacted <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/feng-fu-384030" target="_blank">here</a>.
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Grenfell Tower

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