Fire Risks in Supposedly Safe Buildings
THE following from the Oakland Enquirer of the 19th instant contains facts well worth pondering. Too much care cannot be taken in regard to fires. The fire element once let loose is almost absolutely uncontrollable. In speaking of what has been supposed to be uninflammable materials, and the findings of the Boston experts, the Enquirer says: "To look at a massive stone building it would appear that nothing could be more impregnable to fire, and it required many bitter experiences to prove that this confidence was misplaced. Granite, usually considered a type of solidity, is especially dangerous, as it is full of minute cavities which fill with water and explode when the fire becomes very hot. Brownstone, marble, and other rocks, are almost equally unstable when the destroying element approaches them. To show what a fire can do, the Ames building in Boston may be instanced. This was designed by the great architect, H. H. Richardson, and was thought to be fire-proof. It had a solid brownstone front. Between the floor and ceiling of every story there was a packing of four inches of asbestos, so that if the flooring were fired it could not penetrate to the room below. Yet this great building was wiped out in thirty minutes. Iron is another building material whose defects show themselves in a great fire. When the heat becomes intense the iron pillars in the fronts of buildings expand so much that this movement is alone sufficient to wreck buildings in some cases. And when heated still further they bend and let the building fall."