An extensive set of reconstructions of the Lakanal House fire has led to the conclusion that no single factor was responsible for the deaths of six people in 2009.
David Crowder, business group manager for fire investigation at BRE Global, showed images of the reconstructions his firm helped produce, at a seminar at FIREX International last week.
He told a packed seminar theatre how Lakanal House was a state-of-the-art building at the time of its construction in the late 1950s, featured in the Architects’ Journal, but subsequent alterations and neglect of fire safety techniques were among the factors that led to the lethal spread of fire and smoke.
The presentation was strictly limited to transcripts presented at the inquest, which recently concluded its narrative verdicts into the deaths of Catherine Hickman, Dayana Francisquini and her two children, and Helen Udoaka and her three-week-old daughter.
In a particularly enlightening 3D model of Lakanal House, the audience was shown how the ventilation system was linked to the bathrooms in each flat. The building used a cross ventilation scheme, meaning that the ventilation used the natural power of the wind. This, combined with a vortex of winds around Lakanal on July 3, 2009, explained in part how the smoke was able to travel through the building in the manner it did.
The force and direction of the winds hitting the building made up a large part of the reconstructions that BRE Global worked on.
There were times at which the escape routes were clogged with smoke, and then moments later they would appear to be clear, according to various witness statements at the inquest, indicating how the prevailing wind on the day led to rapidly changing circumstances in the building.
The heat was also phenomenal, with Crowder telling the audience how certain areas were reigniting due to the sheer heat. He also explained how the numerous refurbishments over the years meant there was a significant build-up of paint on the walls, contributing to the fuel load for the fire.
Crowder also explained just how quickly the fire spread from the television set in which it started at 16:15. By 16:19 the first call had been made to London Fire Brigade and just another two minutes after that the blaze had spread to the upper floor of flat 65.
By 16:23 there was smoke logging in flat 79, where Catherine Hickman died, and at the same time the first appliances arrived on the scene. At 16:30 fire spread inside flat 79 through the window panels — only 15 minutes from the fire starting to it impinging into the flat above.
Above all, though, the clear message from Crowder’s fascinating presentation was that a large number of problems — from modifications made to panelling, security doors installed in the 1980s, ventilation, and modifications made within the flats — crept in over time. The various issues came together to make the incident a fatal one.
Click on the images to see more of the slides from Crowder’s presentation.
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