Fight Fires, Support Sprinklers

With the proven value of automatic sprinkler systems to save lives and property and keep small fires from becoming bigger ones, it’s surprising--and troubling--that only five of Orange County’s 34 cities require them in new residences.

Ceiling fire sprinklers should be mandatory in all new homes throughout Orange County. That’s what the county grand jury has recommended. It’s a wise and well-needed suggestion. Any city leery of setting such a standard need only check with its fire officials, or other cities that have one, to learn how highly valued and effective sprinklers are.

The state building code, which Orange County conforms to, requires sprinklers in all commercial buildings and residences of three or more units. Similar restrictions for those with fewer than three units are left to local option.

Local option, as the grand jury found, has been woefully underused.

San Clemente, one of the five cities in the county requiring sprinklers in all new homes (the others are Buena Park, Dana Point, Placentia and Stanton), in 1980 became the first city in the nation to do so. It adopted its law after fire officials estimated that a condominium fire that resulted in a $10,000 property loss would have destroyed more than $1 million--if sprinklers hadn’t controlled the blaze. With the mandatory requirement, the city says its average fire loss is 60% less in homes with sprinklers.

The first moments of a fire determine how fast it will spread and how much loss in life and property it will wreak. Unlike smoke detectors that only warn of danger, fire sprinklers will extinguish a blaze before it becomes a major disaster. Statistics show that sprinklers are more than 92% effective in controlling fires.

In 1999 (the latest fire statistics) there were 2,320 fires in Orange County that killed four people, injured 43 others and caused $13 million in property losses. And four out of every five fire deaths are caused by residential fires.

Considering such statistics, it should not take a fire disaster to prompt public officials to enact the local laws the grand jury urges and make the life-saving fire sprinklers mandatory in all new residences and in single and multifamily homes that undergo major renovations. They can’t put a firefighter in every home. The next best thing is a sprinkler system.