In February a fire in an automated food warehouse in Andover, UK, led to a total loss. The building was fully sprinklered.
A report from Hampshire Fire & Rescue Service now reveals that the warehouse operator, Ocado, turned off the sprinkler system for five minutes in the hope that employees could complete extinguishment. It was not until after this time that the fire brigade was called. Five minutes is a long time when a fire has already caused a sprinkler actuation!
Instead of finding a fire suppressed most probably by one or two sprinklers, the fire brigade met a large fire that was out of control and in an area difficult to access.
Had the sprinkler system not been turned off, it could have kept the suppressed fire small for many hours while the fire brigade accessed it to complete extinguishment.
SUMMARY OF HFRS OCADO REVIEW FINDINGS
- The review team has had access to Ocado owned CCTV footage from within the CFC that shows the ignition sequence and development of the fire.
- Ignition occurred at 0141hrs due to arcing occurring in the charging process of a robot.
- The air sampling fire detection system did not detect the fire as designed. The fire was detected visually by an engineer at 0215hrs, after approximately 30 minutes of sustained combustion and fire spread.
- HFRS were not called at this point. Efforts are made by the Ocado engineers to deal with the fire themselves. The sprinkler system operated at 0226hrs.
- During this period of activity, the sprinkler system is turned off by Ocado staff for a period of 5 minutes
- When it is established that the fire is not extinguished, the sprinkler system is turned back on again by Ocado staff and HFRS are called via 999.
- There was a period of 30 minutes from ignition to discovery and a further 30 minutes from discovery to first call.
The full report is available here
A sprinkler system can only suppress and contain a fire thus protect a building, its occupants and assets if it is allowed to operate as designed and installed to do so.