General / Off-Topic London Flats Fire

[Minonian]

I really not wanted to seemingly gloat in a case like this so i waited for a while out of decency, and i will be as brief as i can.

At first this is a real tragedy.

And yes! This is what you get if you don't heed the warnings, the wise words ignore them, if you don't care about the signs, and don't make the necessary repairs.
(the cracks just getting worse until the whole building collapses)

 

[Trinity Star]

Death toll now 17 (expected to rise).

 

[Hell Razor5543]

I really not wanted to seemingly gloat in a case like this so i waited for a while out of decency, and i will be as brief as i can.

At first this is a real tragedy.

And yes! This is what you get if you don't heed the warnings, the wise words ignore them, if you don't care about the signs, and don't make the necessary repairs.
(the cracks just getting worse until the whole building collapses)

The problem is (amongst other things) that the regulations do not keep up with technology. It is not always possible to guess what new advances will happen in the future. For example, when the World Trade Centre was designed and built it COULD survive a direct hit from an airliner of the time. Then along came the wide body airliners, and jet fuel that burns hotter (so the engines can use less fuel for the same power output). When the aeroplanes then hit the weight and force of the impact broke the fire insulation from the girders, and the fuel then burned hot enough to over stress them. You cannot blame the architects or the bureaucrats for that.

However, saying that, when people drag their heels (for whatever reasons) in implementing or developing safer designs or regulations THEY are, in part, culpable when innocent people are injured or killed. Based on what I have heard so far, there are people guilty of allowing injuries and deaths to occur at Grenfell Tower. I am NOT looking for a scapegoat, but those responsible MUST accept responsibility.

 

[Minonian]

To make a fireproof building what's up to the requirements dictated by common sense (like more than one stairhouse and fire stairs like we can see it in american comics and movies?) and give a minimal damn to the plausible problems especially when they are mentioned at multiple times is not about regulations.

This happened because they was criminally negligent. Is simple is that!

 

[SH4RK-B1TE]

Britain being the most health and safety conscious, failed to add a simple sprinkler system. Ok it its an old tower block but it could still be installed, instead of wasting money adding cladding and other pointless synthetic items.

 

[Minonian]

And that cladding was highly flammable.

 

[Arry]

The problem is (amongst other things) that the regulations do not keep up with technology. It is not always possible to guess what new advances will happen in the future. For example, when the World Trade Centre was designed and built it COULD survive a direct hit from an airliner of the time. Then along came the wide body airliners, and jet fuel that burns hotter (so the engines can use less fuel for the same power output). When the aeroplanes then hit the weight and force of the impact broke the fire insulation from the girders, and the fuel then burned hot enough to over stress them. You cannot blame the architects or the bureaucrats for that.

However, saying that, when people drag their heels (for whatever reasons) in implementing or developing safer designs or regulations THEY are, in part, culpable when innocent people are injured or killed. Based on what I have heard so far, there are people guilty of allowing injuries and deaths to occur at Grenfell Tower. I am NOT looking for a scapegoat, but those responsible MUST accept responsibility.

To me; I see it as an issue of 'the acceptable cost of a human life'. By this I mean that although the general public believe that there cannot by a figure put on a human life; corporations and governments can and will, deicide what are and what are not acceptable costs, when it comes to human safety. The Ford Pinto is a case in point.

https://philosophia.uncg.edu/phi361...oes-business-need-ethics/case-the-ford-pinto/

This is where something done right, costs too much to be acceptable to business. This view is also backed up, the lack of by government imposed regulation and legislation; be it by watering down the required regulation, or simply by 'stalling' the implementation of the required regulation; as seen over the last few days.

 

[Patrick_68000]

Death toll now 17 (expected to rise).

Certainly because there were 120 apartments

 

[Hell Razor5543]

It is at times like these that you find what the community is made of. At the time of writing this over 1 Million pounds has been raised to help those who have been affected, and more than 60 tonnes of various supplies have been contributed (toiletries, clothing, bedding, food, medication, and so on), to the point where the groups have had to take over a warehouse to store and manage it all.

 

[Patrick_68000]

It is at times like these that you find what the community is made of. At the time of writing this over 1 Million pounds has been raised to help those who have been affected, and more than 60 tonnes of various supplies have been contributed (toiletries, clothing, bedding, food, medication, and so on), to the point where the groups have had to take over a warehouse to store and manage it all.

For some disasters, donations can come from a whole country

 

[Hell Razor5543]

For some disasters, donations can come from a whole country

Oh, I DEFINITELY agree with you here.

 

[Hell Razor5543]

The known death toll has reached 30 souls, but the expectation is that this number will increase.

Something I am hearing on the BBC that if the company in charge of the refurbishment had used a different cladding (that was more fire resistant) it would only have cost £2 more per panel. That is only £5,000 more expensive. However, at this moment in time it is not certain which cladding was fitted to the Grenfell Tower.

 

[Arry]

The known death toll has reached 30 souls, but the expectation is that this number will increase.

Something I am hearing on the BBC that if the company in charge of the refurbishment had used a different cladding (that was more fire resistant) it would only have cost £2 more per panel. That is only £5,000 more expensive. However, at this moment in time it is not certain which cladding was fitted to the Grenfell Tower.

It has been confirmed, by the BBC. Also the local Tory council leader stated that the residents did not want the inconvenience of having a sprinkler system fitted.

 

[Patrick_68000]

The angry inhabitants invade the town hall of district

 

[Para Handy]

This article is well worth the read, gives info about survivors and evacuees' fears about their futures - especially towards social cleansing, cut-price "renovations" and lack of any effort by the local council to co-ordinate and inform:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...e-grenfell-tower-locals-face-uncertain-future

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...ger-grenfell-tower-residents-left-in-the-dark

Meanwhile May gets whisked off under police guard amid fears of an immanent riot by the incredibly angry evacuees.


...... and more Tory scum show their colours:

'A Tory councillor responsible for housing on Solihull council appears to have just tweeted something extraordinary at my colleague Martin Belam about the Kensington town hall protest.
Martin tweeted a photograph from the protest and Ken Hawkins responded: “Lets get ourselves a hangin!” and compared them to a lynch mob. '


https://twitter.com/MartinBelam/status/875775166059618308/photo/1

[down]

 

[Arry]

This article is well worth the read, gives info about survivors and evacuees' fears about their futures - especially towards social cleansing, cut-price "renovations" and lack of any effort by the local council to co-ordinate and inform:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...e-grenfell-tower-locals-face-uncertain-future

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...ger-grenfell-tower-residents-left-in-the-dark

Meanwhile May gets whisked off under police guard amid fears of an immanent riot by the incredibly angry evacuees.


...... and more Tory scum show their colours:

'A Tory councillor responsible for housing on Solihull council appears to have just tweeted something extraordinary at my colleague Martin Belam about the Kensington town hall protest.
Martin tweeted a photograph from the protest and Ken Hawkins responded: “Lets get ourselves a hangin!” and compared them to a lynch mob. '


https://twitter.com/MartinBelam/status/875775166059618308/photo/1

[down]

The Tories are just trying to clear the area or borough of Labour voters before the next election. Can't have these commoners living in the richest borough in the country, can we?

 

[Gortron]

This article is well worth the read, gives info about survivors and evacuees' fears about their futures - especially towards social cleansing, cut-price "renovations" and lack of any effort by the local council to co-ordinate and inform:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...e-grenfell-tower-locals-face-uncertain-future

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...ger-grenfell-tower-residents-left-in-the-dark

Meanwhile May gets whisked off under police guard amid fears of an immanent riot by the incredibly angry evacuees.


...... and more Tory scum show their colours:

'A Tory councillor responsible for housing on Solihull council appears to have just tweeted something extraordinary at my colleague Martin Belam about the Kensington town hall protest.
Martin tweeted a photograph from the protest and Ken Hawkins responded: “Lets get ourselves a hangin!” and compared them to a lynch mob. '


https://twitter.com/MartinBelam/status/875775166059618308/photo/1

[down]

You know I find that sort of thing extremely distasteful. Loads of people died in a horrible fire and already people are trying to politicise it without any real facts beyond lots of poor people in London being burnt to death in a tower block. And here people blaming Tories... ?

There will never be any progress if this is the way we approach the difficult problems in our country. I want to know why so many poor people that clearly weren't born in the UK were stuffed into a gigantic tower block in London in the first place? There is life outside of London and frankly it looks like ghettoization.

 

[dannysquid]

You know I find that sort of thing extremely distasteful. Loads of people died in a horrible fire and already people are trying to politicise it without any real facts beyond lots of poor people in London being burnt to death in a tower block. And here people blaming Tories... ?

There will never be any progress if this is the way we approach the difficult problems in our country. I want to know why so many poor people that clearly weren't born in the UK were stuffed into a gigantic tower block in London in the first place? There is life outside of London and frankly it looks like ghettoization.

Don't disagree but I've found the weird sluggishness of the local council and Theresa May to show some leadership utterly baffling. Can't they see how it makes them look? Are they all hoping Batman shows up or something?

 

[Hell Razor5543]

It has been confirmed, by the BBC. Also the local Tory council leader stated that the residents did not want the inconvenience of having a sprinkler system fitted.

Part of the problem with sprinkler systems in tower blocks is that you cannot pump the water up very high (as I understand it the current limit is 15 floors). This means that you would have to have storage tanks at various levels (say, every five floors), with pumping systems linking them together. You would then have to pump water up to the first set of storage tanks, then, when this set is full, pump the contents up to the next set of tanks, and so on. Such tanks would have to be large (no point in having tanks with 1 minute of sprinkler activity in their zone), and all of this would take up space, for the tanks, the support structures, and the pipework and pumps.

It has been said that you cannot put a value on a human life. Unfortunately this is not the case. At the risk of being flamed for this paragraph, society has to accept there will always be times when it has to choose what is an acceptable risk, and then manage that risk properly. As we grow up we learn what things can hurt us, and then we do not repeat that experience (such as touching a hot iron to see what it feels like). It may be possible to build a completely safe dwelling (where it would not even be possible to stub a toe), but that dwelling would be prohibitively expensive.

What HAS to happen is for there to be a proper and impartial investigation of all that has happened at Grenfell Tower (including the refurbishment and the materials used), clear and acceptable recommendations to be made, and for them to be acted upon (I am not going to discuss apportioning blame or imprisoning people). After the Ronan Point tower block incident the building regulations were reviewed and updated, and this HAS saved lives. If things had stayed as they were, every time there was a fire in a tower block there would have been a risk of partial or full collapse. However, the building regulations were updated in 1971, and now tower blocks do not collapse (look at Grenfell Tower; days after the inferno it is STILL fully upright; unsafe in some areas, which requires shoring up, but it has not collapsed).

 

[Gortron]

Don't disagree but I've found the weird sluggishness of the local council and Theresa May to show some leadership utterly baffling. Can't they see how it makes them look? Are they all hoping Batman shows up or something?

I sort of see what you are saying. It is becoming pretty clear that our PM might be on 'the spectrum'... Perhaps if people stopped trying to find reasons for her to be and evil witch