THE KADER TOY FACTORY FIRE A tragic industrial fire in Thailand has focused worldwide attention on the need

to adopt and enforce state-of-the-art codes and standards in industrial occupancies. Various domestic and international agencies have focused on this incident following its occurrence. With respect to fire protection concerns, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) cooperated with the International Labour Organization (ILO) and with the Bangkok Police Fire Brigade in documenting this fire. Monday, May 10, was a normal workday at the Kader facility. At approximately 4:00 p.m., as the end of the day shift approached, someone discovered a small fire on the first floor near the south end of Building One. This portion of the building was used to package and store the finished products, so it contained a considerable fuel load . Each building at the facility had a fuel load composed of fabric, plastics and materials used for stuffing, as well as other normal workplace materials. Security guards in the vicinity of the fire tried unsuccessfully to extinguish the flames before they called the local police fire brigade at 4:21 p.m. Authorities received two more calls, at 4:30 p.m. and 4:31 p.m. The Kader facility is just beyond the jurisdictional boundaries of Bangkok, but fire apparatus from Bangkok, as well as apparatus from Nakhon Pathom Province, responded. As the workers and security guards tried in vain to extinguish the fire, the building began filling with smoke and other products of combustion. Survivors reported that the fire alarm never sounded in Building One, but many workers grew concerned when they saw smoke on the upper floors. Despite the smoke, security guards reportedly told some workers to stay at their stations because it was a small fire that would soon be under control. Even with the help of six large hydraulic cranes that were moved to the site to facilitate the search for victims, it was several days before all the bodies could be removed from the rubble. There were no fatalities among the fire-fighters, although there was one injury.

Summary : On May 10, 1993, a major fire at the Kader Industrial (Thailand) Co. Ltd. factory located in the Nakhon Pathom Province of Thailand killed 188 workers (Grant and Klem 1994). This disaster stands as the worlds worst accidental loss-of-life fire in an industrial building in recent history, a distinction held for 82 years by the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire that killed 146 workers in New York City (Grant 1993). Despite the years between these two disasters, they share striking similarities.

The fire spread rapidly throughout Building One, and the upper floors soon became untenable. The blaze blocked the stairwell at the south end of the building, so most of the workers rushed to the north stairwell. This meant that the fire alarms in Buildings Two and Three reportedly functioned properly, and all the workers in those two buildings escaped. The workers in Building One were not so fortunate. A large number of them jumped from the upper floors. In all, 469 workers were taken to the hospital, where 20 died. The other dead were found during the post-fire search of what had been the north stairwell of the building. Many of them apparently succumbed to lethal products of combustion before or during the buildings collapse. According to the latest information available, 188 people, most of them female, have died as a result of this fire. Determining the cause of this fire became a challenge because the portion of the facility in which it began was totally destroyed and the survivors have provided conflicting information. Since the fire started near a large electrical control panel, investigators first thought that problems with the electrical system might have been the cause. They also considered arson. At this time, however, Thai authorities feel that a carelessly discarded cigarette may have been the source of ignition. The arrangement of the exits was poor, the fixed fire protection systems were insufficient or ineffective, the initial fuel package was readily combustible, and the horizontal and vertical fire separations were inadequate. In addition, neither company had provided its workers with adequate fire safety training. Inadequate exit arrangements were perhaps the most significant factor in the high loss of life at both the Kader and the Triangle fires. Had the exiting provisions of NFPA 101, the Life Safety Code, which was established as a direct result of the Triangle fire, been applied at the Kader facility, substantially fewer lives would have been lost (NFPA 101, 1994). Several fundamental requirements of the Life Safety Code pertain directly to the Kader fire. For example, the Code requires that every building or structure be constructed, arranged and operated in such a way that its occupants are not placed in any undue danger by fire, smoke, fumes or the panic that may occur during an evacuation or during the time it takes to defend the occupants in place. Conclusion: Industry will probably always handle materials that have challenging fire protection characteristics, but manufacturers should recognize these characteristics and take the necessary precautions to minimize associated hazards. Building owners and operators must also be aware that they are responsible for ensuring that their employees working environment is safe. At the very least, the stateof-the-art fire protection design reflected in fire codes and standards must be in place to minimize the possibility of a catastrophic fire.

As we look to the future, we need to recognize all that we need to do, as a global society, to prevent history from repeating itself. Recommendation: The exits should be arranged and maintained so that they provide free and unobstructed egress from all parts of a building whenever it is occupied. Each of these exits should be clearly visible, or the route to every exit should be marked in such a way that every occupant of the building who is physically and mentally able readily knows the direction of escape from any point. Every vertical exit or opening between the floors of a building should be enclosed or protected as necessary to keep the occupants reasonably safe while they exit and to prevent fire, smoke and fumes from spreading from floor to floor before the occupants have had a chance to use the exits. The most effective way to limit vertical fire spread is to enclose stairwells, elevators, and other vertical openings between floors. Reports of features such as caged freight elevators at the Kader factory raise significant questions about the ability of the buildings passive fire protection features to prevent vertical spread of fire and smoke.

CASE STUDY Fire Incident Case

Group member: Amy Delgado Carol Perez Jimwell Manalo