I'd have to dig out my copy of the report, but all the fatalities were from the blast and (mostly) collapse, IIRC. I don't recall there being any fire or if it was it was very small.
A couple of years later the International Association of Arson Investigators met in LV and went over that in really great detail. The HQ hotel was the Bally (earlier the MGM). It was strange sitting right next to where the fire blew out the front door like a blo wtorch.
And then, LV got a fire truck (largest in the country then). Posted right off the Strip at a fire house. I wish I could find the picture. I occasionally speak with a strip fire captain and he remembers the name of the fire engine. The Engine had a driver on the rear-end to turn corners.
The most important thing is that fire sprinklers are nothing like we see on TV and movies.
1) If one sprinkler goes off it does not trigger other sprinklers.
2) The sprinklers emit more of a mist then a "sprinkle" and cause less then 2% water damage than a fire hose in a similar situation.
If ignorance is bliss you must be one happy fellow. In actual fires bedridden patients, in the same room as the fire origin, survive fires suppressed by automatic fire sprinklers. This is why the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAH) requires sprinklers in all custodial health care facilities. To have smoke kill you the fire has to burn long enough to generate the type of smoke that does the killing. Since sprinklers extinguish the fire while there is still plenty of Oxygen in the compartment of origin the carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide gasses that would kill you are never produced in sufficient quantities to kill.
It is a legitimate exercise of the police power of the state to protect your neighbors from your actions. Requiring residential automatic sprinklers limits the effect of hostile fires to the compartment of origin. That eliminates any chance of the fire spreading to your neighbors home, limits the need for public spending for fire protection, and minimizes the effects of such fires on the community as a whole. Automatic Fire sprinklers are the least cost means of providing a community with effective fire protection. It also shifts the burden of providing the protection to the owners of the properties to be protected and off of the taxpayers. Large buildings which require the most fire protection incur the most fire protection cost. Tax exempt properties can still be required to protect themselves even if they are behind the religious shield. Fire Sprinkler laws are the single most effective way to make those who build the structure provide the means to prevent that structure from becoming a fire protection burden on the rest of the community.
Nobody dies from smoke inhalation, despite what the papers say. They die from lack of oxygen related to high levels of carbon monoxide and its higher affinity for hemoglobin essentially "kicking off" oxygen molecules. They die from burns to the lungs and other tissues. They sometimes die from the various nasty gases (such as phosgene and the ever popular cyanide) that are given off as products of combustion.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.