Many commercial buildings in Calgary have professional sprinkler systems. In fact, most Canadian cities and provinces require sprinkler systems to be installed in structures of a certain construction type or in certain sorts of businesses. While sprinklers are fairly ubiquitous and well-known, the majority of people – even company and building owners – have no clue why they are so important for fire safety and preventing significant fire damage.
Understanding the significance of sprinkler systems can help you understand why appropriate maintenance and testing are required. It will also verify that your sprinkler systems are properly placed, primed, and ready to use in an emergency. So, why should you be concerned about commercial sprinkler systems at your workplace? Here are four major reasons why these fire protection systems are critical:
Fire Protection/Fire Suppression Systems Save People’s Lives
Above all, the preservation of life should always be the first priority in any scenario. Nothing saves more lives than a properly maintained automatic sprinkler system when it comes to fire safety systems. According to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), there has never been a report of more than two lives being lost inside a structure with a fully automated, well-maintained sprinkler system. This single statistic exemplifies their efficacy perfectly.
Fire Protection/Fire Suppression Systems reduce potential losses by half
The aftermath of a fire may be disastrous to businesses, but sprinklers substantially improve matters. Automatic fire sprinklers have been shown to reduce property damage, injuries, and mortality by more than 50% when used in conjunction with other early warning fire/life safety devices.
Businesses that are not sprinkler-protected can literally burn to the ground. Even when insurance covers the expense of rebuilding, a business’s loss of clientele might be so severe that it never reopens.
Fire Protection/Fire Suppression Systems contain the problem before it becomes uncontrollable
Smoke detectors, heat detectors, and flame detectors can all alert building occupants of a fire, but they cannot put it out. When an automated sprinkler head reaches a certain temperature, it will open and begin deluging the flame with water and will continue to do so until the fire department cuts off the water supply. This can either totally extinguish the fire before it has a chance to spread, or it can greatly delay the development of the flames, allowing firefighters those crucial seconds that are frequently required to preserve property and life. It improves safety while minimizing property damage in either situation.
Fire Protection/Fire Suppression Systems have almost no flaws
Anyone who has ever seen a TV show or a movie has most likely seen a scene in which a fire sprinkler system is activated when a fire alarm is pulled. Sprinkler systems are portrayed deceptively in movies, leading many people to believe that all sprinklers in a system are linked together and that when one is activated by heat, they all activate. Extinguishing a fire would just be trading fire damage for water damage, which is not how fire sprinklers work.
To activate a fire sprinkler system, the bulb or fuse situated within each sprinkler head must be heated to a particular temperature. Individual sprinklers are only activated in the case of a genuine fire.
The sprinkler heads are sensitive enough to open just when needed, but not so sensitive that they cause excessive water damage to your property. In reality, studies have shown that sprinklers are activated in more than 90% of all recorded building fires that are large enough to trigger the systems. In other words, they work 9 out of 10 times. When they fail one out of every ten times, it is usually often due to a lack of maintenance.
Contact Gunner Fire Protection immediately if you need commercial and residential Calgary fire protection systems, fire suppression systems, fire sprinklers installed, tested, inspected, or repaired. As an experienced Calgary fire protection company with over 12 years of experience maintaining fire sprinklers, you can rely on our skilled staff to bring your building up to code and make it fire-safe.