Computers & Security, 11 (1992) 19-23

A High Rise Building Fire Case Study Belden Menkus Post Off& Bos 129, Hillsboro TN37342, USA

A midtown Philadelphia high-rise build-

ing fire that occurred on 23 February 199 I illustrarcs a number of issues that

should concern anyone responsible for

the security of computing acriviries

located in such a structure. The blaze

forced the rclocarion of more than 2500

workers whose employers wcrc housed

in the structure. An examination of this

incident can help in understanding ccrrain of the vulncrabilities of thcsc

structures to fire and the wcaknesscs of

some of their security provisions.

Fire Incident Background

T he 18; hour fire was the second major high-rise

buildin blaze to hit citv ccntcr Philadcfphia in some 26 months. The blaze gutted tight floors of the 38-floor One Meridian Plaza building. The structure is located on Penn Square opposite Phila- dclphia’s City Hall. (The build- ing was erected in 1072 as the hcadquartcrs of the Girard Bank, now a part of the Mellon Bank. As late as 1985 the largest data processing facility in Phila-

delphia was housed in this struc- ture.)

One Meridian Plaza had 27 tenants at the time of the fire. The largest of these was the regional hcadquartcrs of Meridian Bancorp, a bank holding organization. (It occup- ied eight floors in the structure. including its lobby and con- course levels.) The fire reportedly was visible for many milts in nearby sections of both Pcnnsyl- vania and New Jcrscy. Sonic 200 Philadelphia fircfightcrs wcrc involved in extinguishing the 1 Z- alarm blaze; three of them lost their lives in the effort.

The fire rcportcdly began on the building’s 22nd floor and spread

cvcntually to its 30th floor, where the blaze was finally stopped by a water sprinkler fire extinguishing system. The point of ignition was reportedly in an unoccupied office in which

cmployccs of F.X. Griffin Com- pany, a Manayunk, PA, building renovation organization, had earlier in the day been toucl~ing 14p

wall panclling with a linseed oil- based paint thinner.

Factors in the Spread of the Fire

An investigation of the fire by Philadelphia City Fire Com- missioner Roger Ulshafcr con- cludcd that:

l The Griffin cmployccs left 25 pounds of linseed oil-soaked rags piled on the office floor when they finished their work. This action violated Philadelphia City Fire Code rcquircmcnts that such materials bc stored in covcrcd fkcproof containers. The oil apparently gcncratcd suffi- cicnt heat to ignite the rags, which cvcntually ignited con- taincrs of solvent also left nearby.

0167-4048/92/$5.00 0 1992, Elsevier Science Publishers Ltd. 19

6. MenkuslA high rise building fire case study

l The building’s automatic fire alarm system failed as a result of the blaze.

l The building’s heating and air conditioning system, which had been dcsigncd to pump smoke and combustion products from the structure instead of drawing outside air into it. had also failed.

l The One Meridian Plaza security guards had dclaycd a critical four minutes in notif$ing the Fire Dcpartmcnt of the

discovcry of the blaze.

By the time fircfightcrs arrived at the building the fire had spread through a hole in a fire-resistant wall into a room housing the building’s emergency cicctrical gcncrator. Two cmcrgcncy clcc- trical systems wcrc dcstroycd as a result of this. Also, the building’s pumps, lights and elevators could not bc used by the Fire Dcpart- mcnt crews. They wcrc forced to carry the equivalent of almost 23 kg of protective hclmcts, brcath- ing apparatus, and other cquip- mcnt up 22 flights of stairs just to arrive at the fire site.

Firefighting Problems

When a fire occurs above the tenth floor of a building fir+ fighters arc not able to USC so- called aerial ladders to apply water to the structure. Instead, they normally rely upon the USC of standpipc conncctions- which, csscntially, arc indoor hydrants-throughout the build- ing to its internal water distribu-

tion system. (The alternative to using this system involves pulling conncctcd lengths of water host into the building from outside hydrants and up the structure’s stairwell to the fire site.)

Commissioner Ulshafcr’s investigation indicated that firefighting efforts had been

hampcrcd by flow restriction valves that had been placed in the building’s internal water distribution system. Thcsc valves had been installed apparently as an economy measure. The investigation detcrmincd that the valves had been set below legal water pressure standards. This further obstructed efforts to incrcasc the water prcssurc applied to the fire on the building’s upper floors. Firefighters rcportcdly spent more than scvcn hours on the night of the blaze attempting to rcmovc the flow restriction valves and to rcstorc nccdcd water prcssurc.

Mcanwhilc, Fire Dcpartmcnt hosts wcrc carried into adjacent high-rise structures and water was pumped through portable water cannons onto One Meridian Plaza through the windows of thcsc buildin

B s.

(Questions have rcportcd y been raised about the April 19%)

certification by an indcpcndcnt inspection scrvicc of the pcrformancc adequacy of One Meridian Plaza’s water sprinkler fire extinguishing system.)

A 198 1 Philadelphia City ordinance had required that newly constructed high-rise buildings bc equipped throughout with sprinkler extinguishing systems. Howcvcr. an older building like One Meridian Plaza was considcrcd to bc in compliance with the ordinance if it installed sprinklers in its bascmcnt, restaurant kitchens, hallways, lobbies, confcrcncc rooms, ballrooms, and any space in which combustible materials wcrc stored. (One Meridian Plaza had rcportcdly conformed to thcsc rcquircmcnts bcforc the fire occurred.) Expansion of the sprinkler system rcquircmcnts for older structures had been opposed by the Philadelphia Building Owners and Managers Association. Its mcmbcrs

reportedly wanted to avoid the multi-million dollar costs typically associated with retrofitting a sprinkler system into a high-rise building. In this instance sprinklers had been

installed on the 30th to the 35th floors of One Meridian Plaza at its own cxpcnsc by the tenant that occupied this space.

Although the fire directly damaged only six floors of this structure, it rcndcrcd the cntirc structure csscntially uninhabitable. Water damage was rcportcdly spread throughout the structure into arcas that had not been damaged either directly by the fire or by the combustion products that it gcncratcd. The fire apparently

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Computers and Security, Vol. 7 I, No. 1

destroyed the insulation on the building’s structural steel framework and distorted it. The blaze cracked the structure’s granite facade and sections of it may fall into the street. There is a strong possibly that the building will have to bc dcmolishcd and a new one constructed in its place. (This action would make One Meridian Plaza the first U.S. high-rise building to bc demolished as a result of a fire). One Meridian Plaza tenants, along with those of several adjacent high-rise structures, wcrc barred from returning to their offices for some time after the fire was extinguished. And, when Meridian Bancorp employees did rc-enter their space in the building they discovcrcd that the ceiling had collapsed from the accumulated water.

Most One Meridian Plaza tenants, including Meridian Bancorp, did not cxpcct to reoccupy their space in the building for some time, if ever. The role, if any, of insurers in restoring the building was not clear. The primary insurer of One Meridian Plaza was Aetna Lift and Casualty, Hartford, CT, which also held a mortgage on the building from its owners, Equitable Real Estate Invcstmcnt Management (a subsidiary of the New York City-based Equitable Lift Assurance Society) and Richard Rubin and Co., a Ncthcrlands-based pension fund. Thcsc two organizations arc the object of two class action lawsuits

seeking a total of $1.1 billion in combined compensatory and punitive damages. One legal action was initiated on behalf of One Meridian Plaza’s tenants and their employees. The other was launched by a consortium of those organizations located in nearby structures that wcrc forced to relocate or to suspend their operations as a result of the fire.

Disaster Impacts

Reportedly very few of the tenants of One Meridian Plaza had developed formal disaster recovery plans. Most were forced to relocate their employees into other nearby structures. (Apparently a surplus of available suitable sublcasable commercial real estate in city ccntcr Philadelphia at the time of the fire, rather than tenant planning, cased relocation.) Howcvcr, the Paine-Wcbber securities organization rclocatcd the 37 brokers in its Philadelphia regional offcc to the AT&T

disaster rccovcry hot site in Wcchaukcn, NJ, about five milts Northwest of Paint-Wcbbcr’s New York City financial district hcadquartcrs.

Another tenant of One Meridian Plaza, 1838 Invcstmcnt Advisors, indicated that it routinely backed up its computer records on magnetic tape and stored them safely offsitc. Howcvcr, other organizations did not fart so well. Rcportcdly the Philadelphia Dcloitte and Touchc Tax

Division had not yet computerized its operations. With more than 1000 corporate and individual clients at the time of this fire, it lost all of the massive paper files covering its client histories and the returns for the 1990 and 199 1 tax years.

Security Exposures

This incident illustrates scvcral aspects of high-rise structure fires that often arc ovcrlookcd in the formulation of disaster rccovcry plans. Four major exposures arc involved.

(1) The probable broad scope of the damage that such a fire can Inflict-even on occupancies that arc outside of the immcdiatc fire site. (Most rccovcry plans appear to assume that, even whcrc the fire damage will be intcnsc, it will occur in a narrowly circumscribed area. Very few of thcsc plans allow for possible conscqucntial damages.)

(2) The failure of many building managers to inspect and repair non-obvious dcfccts in such things as fire walls, clcctrical and tclccon~munication cable openings, and water distribution systems. (Studies of high-rise building fires have suggested that such a blaze tends to spread from floor to floor through broken windows and through the openings crcatcd for intcrfloor air circulation and for cabling runs through floors and ceilings. In the cast of the One Meridian Plaza fire the blaze reportedly

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B. MenkuslA high rise building fire case study

circumvcntcd the intcrfloor installation of fire-resistant materials by spreading also along the cxtcrior granite face of the building through windows that had been broken by the heat.)

(3) The difficulties that fircfightcrs commonly face in extinguishing blazes of this type, cvcn under the best of circumstances. (Even in an optimum situation, extinguishing a fire in a high-rise structure is not a surgical process. Fire Dcpartmcnt truck pumps typically arc not able to reach above about 12 floors. Fires above that lcvcl arc almost impossible to extinguish if an indcpcndcnt water supply is not available.)

(4) The delays commonly associated with reoccupying fire- damaged space. (Too many disaster recovery plans assume

that cmployccs will bc able to return to a fire damaged offcc or work area within hours-or at the most, a few days-after a blaze is cxtinguishcd. In most instances, such an assumption is unrealistic. Post-disaster rccovcr) of cvcn the most basic services tends to take longer than initially might seem to bc reasonable. Take, for cxamplc, the rccovcr) situation after a major ice storm struck the Rochcstcr, NY, arca on March 3 1991. A rcprcscntativc of Rochcstcr Gas and Electric announced on March 17 that the utility finally had rcstorcd scrvicc to the last of its 200000 customers who had

lost clcctricity in the storm. A rcprcscntativc of the Rochester Tclcphonc Corporation told the Associated Press news service on the same day that thousands of its customers who had been affcctcd by the storm still wcrc without tclcphonc scrvicc.

immediate Reactions

Collcctivcly thcsc cxposurcs suggest that it is wise to:

(1) Challcngc the assumptions about both the cxtcnt of damage and the feasibility of prompt restoration of operations that have been used in dcvcloping any data processing disaster rccovcry plan that is being cxamincd. If appropriate, rccommcnd that the Dlan be rcformulatcd on a m&c realistic basis. For example, the plan could include practical provisions for relocating critical data processing operations and the staff mcmbcrs associated with them to a dcsignatcd site for an cxtcndcd period.

(2) Avoid total rcliancc on rcptwwlafions from cithcr a building manager or an outside inspection scrvicc in dctcrmining the scope of cithcr a structure’s vulnerability to fire or the risk associated with such an cvcnt. In both casts, thcsc rcprescntations understandably tend to undcrstatc both what is involved and its probable conscqucnccs. In some instances, for cxamplc, the information systems auditor could actually inspect the arcas

in question and take Polaroid@ photographs of the findings. Thcsc photographs can bc used as audit cvidcncc for inclusion in the audit work papers and a subscqucnt audit report.

Response Plan

Gcncrally building owners and managers assume that the tenant is rcsponsiblc for protecting the space that it occupies in a high- rise structure against any possible injury to its cniployccs or damage to its property that may result from a fire. However, it

may be wise, in this increasingly litigious society, not to rely too unrealistically on a such an implied disclaimer of responsibility. A number of actions will permit a building owner or manager to contend successful that a rcasonablc lcvcl of care has been cxcrciscd with rcspcct to tenant fire safety. This can bc dcmonstratcd by such things as:

(I) Insisting that periodic building evacuation drills arc held. Any possible minor inconvcnicncc to cmployccs and visitors will bc more than compcnsatcd by a hcightcncd awarcncss of how to act in a f&c- rclatcd cmcrgcncy.

(2) Training regularly the security offccrs, building clcancrs, and others who work in the structure in how to report and respond to fires and comparable cmcrgcncics. (Among the problems that may

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be disclosed during the course of the training effort may be such things as rcccnt immigrants employed in thcsc positions who do not speak the local language well enough to permit them to communicate cffcctivcly with a Fire Department dispatcher or other cmcrgcncy services rcprcscntative.)

(3) Ensuring that the building’s water distribution system is able to function reliably in a fire.

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(This effort should include removing water flow restriction valves, no matter why they may have been installed. It also will involve such things as regular inspection, repair and rcplaccmcnt of the building’s interior standpoint valves and hosts and encouraging tenants to install water sprinkler fix-c extinguishing facilities in their spaces. Such systems arc notfail safe, but installing one is

prcfcrable to facing the situation

that exists in One Meridian Plaza.)

(1) Monitoring the USC within the structure of combustible substances by building clcancrs and maintainers, as well as tenants and their contractors. (The right to verify that such materials arc handled and stored in compliance with local Fire Department rcquircments can bc added to the content of the gcncral tenant lcase.)

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