Sprinklers foil arson attacks at Sainsbury’s store in Coventry on 1st and 3rd March 2018
At the beginning of March 2018 there were a series of malicious fires at the Sainsbury’s Canley retail store
The first fire took place at about 1055hrs on Thursday 1st March and involved a rail of clothing within the store. 200+ people were safely evacuated and fire service crews extinguished the fire. Information received from attending Fire Service personnel has confirmed that one sprinkler head on the stores sprinkler system operated to contain the fire, limiting fire damage to about 5m². The fire was reported extinguished within 10 minutes of the sprinkler operating.
A fire service officer reported ”The sprinkler contained the fire to the large clothes rail and stopped further spread to other nearby clothing rails and items. The potential loss if the sprinkler had not intervened would have been greatly multiplied. The involvement of more materials would have made firefighting actions more difficult and the risk to personnel increased. A defensive approach may have been needed and this would have meant a larger ‘contained’ fire with the loss of the building a possibility. This would have affected employees, employers, revenue and community.”
The second fire occurred at about 1000hrs on Saturday 3rd March. A total of 10 firefighters worked with hose reels to put out the blaze which took hold in the clothing department of the store.
Again the sprinkler operated to control the fire. Thankfully there have been no further incidents reported.