Star Fire Construction & Design Concerns

[Twinflow]

As a retired professional firefighter and a frequent cruiser I am very interested in this Ship Fire. My firefighting experience was land based but we did have a working Port in the City. One morning a large freighter caught fire and burned for three days. This ship was docked and we had complete access with land based firefighting equipment. It was an extremely hard fire to fight. During the fire we almost lost six firefighters that ran out of air down inside the ships engine rooms. The ship was a total loss and became scrap metal.

The Star Princess Fire is exceptionally concerning to me as a cruise traveler. My main concern is not if the fire was accidental or malicious. But the rapid spread of the fire from balcony to balcony and deck to deck. I have viewed all the photos and video clips found over the internet. What continues to amaze me is how FAST the fire spread. We know the winds could have had a major effect on the spread. A typical balcony has two chairs, one table and a decking material. One of the photos shows each balcony burning on its own. The dividing panels and frame structure are burning. What type of finish is applied to the aluminum dividers and frames during construction? What type of paint is used on the balcony floors and outside walls of the ship?

A mockup of this ship needs to be reproduced in a laboratory. This mockup should duplicate the side of the ship with several decks. The same material used to build this ship must be used including the paint finishes. Deck chairs and tables should be used with the same deck coverings. The wind could be reproduced including the direction. There are serious design issues with this class of Princess Ship. Remember this FIRE already happened and it can occur again with a more serious loss of LIFE!

Besides finding the origin and cause the design defects must be corrected before this ship carries passengers again.

:confused:

[Dolphins]

I totally agree that serious questions must be raised about possible problems not previously recognized. The normal furniture on balconies could not provide enough fuel for a fire of this intensity.

[bdjam]

You might want to check out this thread where a very enlightened and enlightening discussion is going on about the fire itself. I don’t recall one question of the design of the ship. I think your postulation that the design is at fault for this incident might be far-reaching. There have been no indications that the ship design had anything to do with this. You've mentioned on two different threads that the design issues need to be corrected, but you don't mention what those issues might be or what you think needs to be done about them.

As I posted after your post on the other thread - this class of ship has been in service for almost 10 years and this is the first time this has happened...if there was a design deficiency, wouldn't we have seen signs of it by now?

 

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=319701&page=9

[Dolphins]

You might want to check out this thread where a very enlightened and enlightening discussion is going on about the fire itself. I don’t recall one question of the design of the ship. I think your postulation that the design is at fault for this incident might be far-reaching. There have been no indications that the ship design had anything to do with this. You've mentioned on two different threads that the design issues need to be corrected, but you don't mention what those issues might be or what you think needs to be done about them.

As I posted after your post on the other thread - this class of ship has been in service for almost 10 years and this is the first time this has happened...if there was a design deficiency, wouldn't we have seen signs of it by now?

 

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=319701&page=9

 

 

As a retired fire officer (FDNY), I am familiar with the other thread as I have contributed to it. The question we are raising is in the materials used on the balconies. Is the current deck covering subject to easy ignition and rapid fire spread? Could the panels separating the balconies be a problem? There must be an explanation as to why, barring an accelerant, the fire reached such intensity.

[loungelizard]

I have posted this thought a few times, but no one has really responded...

 

Is it possible that the cantilevered design of the balconies added to the speed in which the fire spread? The balconies are like a set of stairs and perhaps the embers dropped to the next balcony ( and so on...like a Slinky dropping from stair to stair ) Most cruiseships have decks of balconies that are straight below each other, like a city building. I wonder if the embers would have just fallen into the sea if they weren't in the staggered design. I'm really curious about this so I'd appreciate some opinions....thanks.

[spongerob]

First of all, the circumstances surrounding this fire are unkown, so speculating that the design or selection of materials is "defective" is premature. After the investigation is complete there will be a discussion of "what happened that we did not imagine" and "can we do anything to prevent it happening again?" Changes will be implemented accordingly.

[Globaliser]

You might want to check out this thread where a very enlightened and enlightening discussion is going on about the fire itself. I don’t recall one question of the design of the ship.

I did ask a similar question at this point on that thread, and got some thoughtful answers.

 

For myself, I do still wonder whether what is revealed by this fire might have some effect on future design. I hope that it does not require a rethink or rebuild of existing ships, as that would be devastating for the industry.

 

That thread is by far the best thread of all that I've read about the fire. Highly recommended.

[disney_leonard]

I believe that all cruise lines will be required to expand fire sprinkler coverage to balconies. For some reason it has been assumed that sprinklers were not necessary on balconies. This incident proves that is incorrect. There are more challenges with sprinkler heads exposed to sea water as far as corrosion is concerned but they do have them in outside areas where passengers travel. If you consider how hard it was to fight this fire from on board the ship itself it is amazing that they were able to get it out before it did even more damage. Princess did a great job from everything I have read.

[bdjam]

As a retired fire officer (FDNY), I am familiar with the other thread as I have contributed to it. The question we are raising is in the materials used on the balconies. Is the current deck covering subject to easy ignition and rapid fire spread? Could the panels separating the balconies be a problem? There must be an explanation as to why, barring an accelerant, the fire reached such intensity.

That is the question you’re asking – and while I think the material to be fire resistant, it is a perfectly legitimate question. The original poster, however, has indicated there are design flaws in the Grand Class ships – that’s a totally different thing.

[cruisingpeople]

For the past and present firefighters on this thread, If you are familiar with the product "Dri-Deck" that is used for fire apparatus compartments and floors, this is the same rubberized material that they use on the balconies. I have to say that the amount of fire that I viewed in pictures and on video during this blaze makes me wonder what could have contributed to the fireload.

[Dolphins]

I believe that all cruise lines will be required to expand fire sprinkler coverage to balconies. For some reason it has been assumed that sprinklers were not necessary on balconies. This incident proves that is incorrect. There are more challenges with sprinkler heads exposed to sea water as far as corrosion is concerned but they do have them in outside areas where passengers travel. If you consider how hard it was to fight this fire from on board the ship itself it is amazing that they were able to get it out before it did even more damage. Princess did a great job from everything I have read.

 

I suggest it might be more practical and economical to merely eliminate any combustible material on balconies than to install exterior sprinklers. If you remove the fuel, you all but eliminate the fire hazard.

[snowbird1]

Hi,

 

I think Cruisingpeople has one of the answers! I was just on the Star about a month ago and my friend had a balcony very close to the area that has now burned. The balconies all have that rubber mat and I would imagine that stuff would burn quickly, melt and then spread while on fire.

[TinAngel]

Hi

 

Special thanks to the Firefighters.

 

I believe I can promise photos of the work that will be done in Germany.

Suspect that another poster on the tech thread also has contacts at the shipyard. Just depends on visual access and any security restrictions..

 

I did post a good fairly his res photo link on page 18 of the tech messages,

the angle is what I like, it really denotes how serious this entire mess is.

 

I sure as heck will not be booking any ship related to this ships class or design.

 

The potential passengers will "deny" the realities. All civilians do such. I sure as heck post my safety stuff but usually on the SCUBA and snorkeling areas.

 

The Carribean options for aid and rescue are nil. Cubans do have some

capacities, Mexico has nil for choppers, nil presence of USCG and US Navy ships. The Brits stopped deploying a few years ago. Key West is really not a Naval Base but an Air Station. The US and Brits were on the scene for both Aden Gulf disasters this week, see my tech post. Talk about a fire at sea.

What a scary week for nautical voyagers when you look at the other screw-ups.

 

Closest ships are other cruise liners. I suspect this Captain did not call for aid.

I hate adding speculation but what he did as to keeping the ship moving may go down as smart or not. But we and I have no data on that.

 

That is about all: I still do some sailing. That is not cruising but tacking and using the wind. Not many resources in these cruise line areas for real help. I see we have even bigger ships about to launch. Sounds like that movie "The Towering Inferno" all over again.

 

DOC

 

It was what about 1974 or so. I recall the premier showings were benefits for Fire Departments in many cities. I recall as I took my younger siblings and the ticket costs were high but hell, I saved my money while in Vietnam. :rolleyes:

[ccrain]

If this fire was started by a cigarette butt, the only major design flaw I see is access to enable the crew to fight such a fire. Perhaps a variation of a carrier's high pressure washdown system may be required with remote controlled high pressure guns off the bridge wings.

 

The tiered system may have contributed to the spreading of the fire, but also made fire fighting access better than the enclosed balconies on the Sun and the Regal - which have the same type of flammable inventory - sans the clear blue plexiglass. Spraying from one deck to another on those ships would be impossible and fire crews would have to fight one balcony at a time since I doubt they could open the movable dividers between cabins.

 

If the tiered exposed balconies are a design flaw, then the upper decks are as well. The same blue plexiglass, resin chairs and lounges, exist, along with that funky blue outdoor carpet, in wind exposed areas with no overhead sprinkler systems. If one is looking for potential design flaws, one could look in a lot of places - how about fiberglass life boats above a teak deck? No netting to catch small children (or drunk adults) that fall off the ship, no safety glass in the public areas. This list could get longer and longer.

 

If the intensity of the fire was caused by the "blue" matting and you remove it, who pays the medical bill when the next person slips and falls on a painted or anodized metal surface on their balcony? Is this ship perfect? Nope. Is any ship? Nope. There are probably several dozen design flaws in every ship on the seas, and planes in the air, and cars on the road, and...and...and we will never get them all.

 

But, I still find it amazing that there wasn't a tremendous loss of life due to this fire. Was it warning? Was it the crew? Was it providence? Was it the ship's design? I don't know.

 

But I do know this. Ship designers will learn from this and incorporate their finding into retrofits and redesigns. Then, the next time something like this major happens, it will be from a totally different cause and have a totally different effect, and the issue of other design flaws will rise again. The proverbial "why didn't I think of that?".

 

The only thing certain is that Murphy will get you when and where you least expect it. All you can ever do is hope to slow him down and make him work for his wins.

[bdjam]

how about fiberglass life boats above a teak deck?

Star Princess was built after the more stringent SOLAS requirements were put into place – these requirements limited the amount of wood allowed in the construction of a cruise vessel – ironically to help control fire. The outside decks on Star Princess are not teak but a resin compound. Great for the endangered trees, and hopefully a way to control on-board fire, but a loss of some of the charm of being on board ship.

[ccrain]

I was thinking more about the Sun class. I wonder if that's teak/wood or if its resin as well?

[iancal]

Fire is the biggest danger at sea on cruiseships. The cruiseship industry is an extremely powerful lobby group. They do not lobby for higher shipbuilding costs and most ships are registered in 'accomodating' countries. If you think there is an issue on cruiseships, do some reseach on airlines-particularily reseach that relates the materials that are used in the cabin. You will be shocked. Highly flammable, highly toxic materials are the norm. Next to nothing has been done by the FAA or other bodies in this regard....again a very powerful industry lobby that puts money well ahead of cabin safety. And a travelling public that wants the lowest possible fares.

[smeyer418]

Actually there have been major changes over the last few years and the NTSB has issued recommendations for changes some of which have been accepted by the FAA. Air travel is clearly the safest form of travel, with EXTREMELY few deaths every year. Yes some of the recommdations should be followed, but if you make the plane heavier, you increase the use of fuel and pollution, which in of itself causes deaths- more deaths than plane crashes. Yes there is unfornately a cost benefit analsys done. Is it ok to spend a billion dollars for every life saved, a million? There is no such thing as an unsinkable fire proof ship. No such thing as an absolutely safe aircraft. There have been less and less deaths caused by fires on planes. At one point they thought they came up with a system that prevented the fuel from exploding in a crash. When they tested in, in the real world it went up like a roman candle. Fuel burns. You have probably seen that test picture many times.

[wildabouttheworld]

If proven that the cause of this fire may have been a candle or cigarette. Isnt the problem more easily solved by having a no smoking or no candle rule for all cabins and balconies. Why must everyone overlook the obvious? No matter what the design, if you allow these types of activities you could end up with a fire. Why cant there be designated smoking areas that have a fire retardant design and materials? Very simply, wouldnt this protect everyone and have prevented this million dollar tragedy and loss of life?

[spongerob]

Quite possibly, Wild, if that is what happened. Condider that it might prove impossible to determine the exact cause, and all there is to rely upon is conjecture. We would then have to examine preentive measures for each of the rumored causes, and ban teenagers from balconies, hard liquor from cabins, coffee pots, power strips, crockpots...you see where I'm going.

[Goldryder]

In relation to construction of ships. These days the biggies are built with composite and aluminium upper decks to cut back on excess weight. The original 'biggies' were significantly smaller and were built from all steel construction. Generally these ships are safer as fires can normally be contained. Another thing that designers are going for in a big way in the last 20 yrs are balconies, lots of them. This has meant that areas of the ships are no longer containable in the event of a fire.

 

To put this in simple terms, a non balcony cabin is effectively a sealed box, only accessible via the cabin door, whereas a balcony cabin is open to the elements on one side. Have a fire in a sealed box and it usually stays there and takes a fair while to spread anywhere else. Have a balcony with a door open and its bound to escape and spread 'like wild fire'. The Caribbean is known for hot stuffy nights, people often sleep with their balcony doors open, that causes a certain amount of vacuum into the cabin as the ship moves. A small fire can balcony hop very easily, the matting, plastic furniture, soft upholstery and drying towels etc on the balcony give the fire its food. Once a few balconies have caught, there is very little you can do to stop it. They suggest 150 balconies were destroyed, thats alot of plastic matting, furniture etc to feed a fire, add in the sea breezes and the relative low melting point of the materials in the construction of the balconies and you have a very well fed fire indeed.

 

Many ships have been lost in the past through fire, some by accidental fires others by arson. Equally there have been many lives lost too, Scandinavian Star in 1990 killed 158 when a small fire was started deliberately in a corridor that spread cyanide fumes around the ship from burning wall construction materials. And in 1971 Queen Elizabeth was destroyed by fire in Hong Kong harbour by an arsonist, the photos of the stages of that fire show just how fast it can take hold, she wasn't moving at the time....

 

http://www.cruiseserver.net/travelpage/ships/cu_qe.asp

 

Scroll to the bottom of the article and you can see how she was lost.

 

At the end of the day, we may never know why or how this fire on Star Princess was started or why/how it spread so fast on an otherwise modern ship. If it leads to changes to the design of existing and future ships, then that has to be a good thing, even if cruises are delayed or cancelled for those alterations to be carried out. The safety of passengers has to take priority over cruise scheduling and if the investigators decide that things have to change, then change they will and those changes will be mandatory.

 

There will be bellyaching about cruises that don't happen etc but people have to remember that its for their own safety. Lessons are going to be learnt from Star Princess...whether it be passengers who feel they don't need to attend that muster drill again or designers trying to fit as many balconies as they can or owners wanting to build bigger ships than their competitors.

 

Consider what might have happened if it had been a Freedom or Genesis ship....this fire will probably rewrite the design handbooks and procedures for muster drills and alot of other things besides.

[CruisinChris]

Please go to http://www.maib.gov.uk or http://www.ntsb.gov to read actual reports from passenger ship fires. The reports are lengthy and very detailed. When the Star report is released, you will no without doubt exactly what actions happened on the bridge at what moment, how the ships' systems performed or were effected before, during and after the fire, how the fire was fought, details of how all injuries occured, the reactions and performance of the crew, and discussion of cause. Each of the existing reports are very interesting and enlightening because they also discuss building codes and standards. I highly recommend the Carnival Ecstasy fire report and the Nieuw Amsterdam fire reports. Especially to those of you professionals who are trying to inform yourselves.

[steve20832]

I know the county I live in requires all structures to have sprinklers installed. This includes commercial buildings, single family homes, condos, apartment buildings, and townhomes. And they are required to have have firewalls inbetween the units. Why are cruise ships not built with fire safety in mind? I don't see why a cruise doesn't have sprinklers in the cabins and more firewalls. After all, you see them in hotels.

[smeyer418]

It does. No one requires sprinklers outside. Even if they did, it would be a challenge to create one that would survive both tropical heat and frozen alaska tempuratures. Aluminum is normally considered fire rated. The problem is that above a certain tempuratures it burns as well. The Brits toyed with building an unsinkable air craft carrier in WW II out of ice. You can build one that doesn't burn out of concrete too. But if you put in beds, there isn't one that is fire proof yet.

[bdjam]

I was thinking more about the Sun class. I wonder if that's teak/wood or if its resin as well?

I think the new regulations came in right around the time Star came into service – the Sun Class ships are teak, and I believe Grand Princess is as well – don’t know about Golden.