Building fire protection into

low-rise multifamily homes

How the U.S. could catch up with the The fact is that building and fire code requirements
for low-rise construction generally offer less protection
rest of the technologically advanced than for mid-rise buildings. Many communities still per-
world mit low-rise multifamily buildings to be constructed of
the same combustible materials as single-family homes.
But townhouses and garden apartments have one seri-
BY GLEN W. SIMON ous difference from single-family dwellings— each fam-
BUILDING CONSTRUCTION DEPARTMENT ily is vulnerable to any fire-safety negligence by its
PORTLAND CEMENT ASSOCIATION neighbors. Unless the community’s building code pro-
SKOKIE, ILLINOIS vides for a reasonable degree of fire separation between
units, families living in townhouses or garden apart-
ments are not getting the fire protection they need.
ow-rise multifamily homes are two or more at- Howe ve r, not all apartments lack this essential fire

L tached units that may be up to three stories in

height. These projects are often called garden
a p a rt m e n t s. Quadruplexes (known also as
“quads” or “four-plexes”) are semidetached four-family
d we l l i n g s. Apartments built with the individual units
protection. Occupants of a concrete building, for exam-
ple, know they are well protected from the spread of fire
because the structural materials in the building will nei-
ther burn nor permit fire to spread from one apartment
to another.
two or three stories high and attached to each other are Unfortunately, some communities continue to allow
known as townhouses. Whatever the type of low - ri s e the use of combustible construction for low-rise hous-
construction—garden, duplex, townhouse, quad, six- ing. Sometimes improvements are made in local build-
flat— these buildings house two or more groups of peo- ing code requirements—after a fire has swept through
ple under one roof. eight or ten living units clustered in one structure in the
community.
Seventy-eight percent of fire deaths
are residential t “Significance of Fire Ratings for Building Construction,” Fire Protection
Planning Report, Portland Cement Association, Skokie, Illinois, publication
Fires in residential buildings contribute heavily to cur- number SR179.01H, 6 pages.
rent fire loss statistics. Of $3 billion in property loss of
all types each year, $1 billion is residential fire property
loss. But the loss of life is even more tragic. A recent Figure 1.
study* by the National Fire Protection Association (NF- Annual fire
PA) points out that of approximately 9950 fire deaths in deaths and
the United States in 1977 about 7800, or 78 percent, were injuries in
residential. This estimate is substantially larger than the various
8800 deaths estimated by NFPA for 1976; it places new countries per
emphasis on the severity of the residential fire problem million of
and the need to do something about it. population.

U.S. not a fire-safe country

Very often, residents of townhouses and garden apart-
ments in the United States are not getting the built-in
fire protection they need and expect. They are not usu-
Figure 2. Dwellings
ally aware of this because they assume the community’s should be
building code protects them. But according to a fire compartmented, that
marshal in Maryland, “Townhouses are little more than is designed and built
garden apartments with a fancier name but lacking so that any fire will be
many of the fire protection features provided in garden confined to the
apartments.” dwelling unit where it
originates.
* Louis Derry, “A Study of United States Fire Experience, 1977,” Fire Journal,
September 1978, pages 67-72 and 125.
 The United States is supposedly a technologically ad- Fire walls must extend through adjacent combustible
vanced country. Yet no other industrialized nation in parts of the building, such as a roof, an exterior wall or
the world comes close to our fire-death and fire-injury balcony. Otherwise fire can spread from one apartment
rate. Figure 1, based on NFPA data, t shows fire deaths unit to another by igniting the combustible framing ma-
and injuries per million population in various countries. t e ri a l s. The extension of a fire wall through and above
The data for the United States indicate that a lot of fire any roof made of combustible framing elements pre-
protection work must be done. vents horizontal spread of fire across the roof. (With fire-
resistant roofs, howe ve r, fire walls need not extend
How to make homes safer
through the roof deck.) To prevent fire passage around
Many steps may be taken to reduce the number of fire the end of a fire wall, the fire wall must be extended be-
injuries and loss of life and pro p e rt y. Early warning yond the exterior wall of the building.
smoke detectors and heat detectors can be used to warn Fire-resistant floors. It is important to prevent the ve rt i-
occupants about a fire. Sprinklers can be installed in cal spread of fire in garden apartments and townhouses
high hazard areas. But the most important way to by using fire-resistant floors. Concrete floors from 31⁄2 to
achieve greater safety for life and property is to require 5 inches thick are ample for a two-hour fire rating, de-
better fire-resistant construction. Fire ratings in codes pending on aggregates used (Figure 3).
must be upgraded. Fire-resistant balconies. Fire-resistant balconies offer no
The same fire-resistant materials and construction
fuel to a fire and help to prevent the vertical spread of
methods should be required for low-rise as for mid-rise
fire. They can also serve as a refuge for occupants dur-
buildings if deaths, injuries and property losses are to
ing a fire. Unfortunately, many apartment managers per-
be reduced. Proper selection of building materials is the
basic first step necessary to prevent or minimize the
spread of fire.
L ow - rise structures must be built so that fire will be
confined to as small an area as possible and prevented
from spreading from the dwelling unit where it origi-
nates (Figure 2). To accomplish this, each residential
unit should be compartmented with fire-resistant floors
and walls which have a fire-resistance rating of at least
one hour. Two-hour ratings are preferred for added fire
protection. A fire safety authority has said, “We shall
never have a fire-safe environment in apartment living
until buildings are designed and constructed so that a
single unit can sustain a complete burnout without
jeopardizing other units or occupants.”
Basic fire protection
Controlling burnouts and providing basic fire protec- In this small apartment building noncombustible floors
tion requires: cantilever to form the balconies.
Compartmentation. The units should be tightly com-
partmented with fire-resistant building elements. This
may require more than the simple use of materials with
1-hour fire ratings. Apartment walls with so-called 1-
hour fire ratings have sometimes suffered early failures
due to choice of materials or construction practices, or
both. Insulated drywalls between apartment units, for
example, are designed to serve as fire walls but are not
always effective. They hold off the heat only so long; af-
ter a period of time they break down and fire breaks
through. Walls between apartment units (party walls),
corridor walls and stairway exit walls should all be con-
structed of concrete or masonry.
Fire walls. Fire walls must be self supporting and
designed to maintain their structural integrity even with
surrounding collapse. Such a wall is made of fire-resis- This is a step in the direction of fire safety. The fire wall
tant materials and installed as a barrier to confine the extends above the roof and also out from the building line.
spread of fire to a limited area. Thorough building The mansard roof has a masonry wall behind it.
inspection is especially important in this type of Unfortunately, however, combustible sheathing under the
construction. shingles can spread fire vertically up the roof.
 Figure 3.
The fire of INSURANCE SAVINGS WITH CONCRETE
resistance
of concrete
depends Concrete has the natural ability to provide safe-
on the ty during and after severe fire exposure. For this
thickness and other reasons insurance companies establish
and the lower rates for concrete and masonry construc-
aggregate tion. Base rates are established by Insurance Ser-
used. A vices Offices (ISO) in various locations. In Atlanta,
siliceous for example, the ISO base rate for wood frame and
aggregate wood exterior construction is $1.60 per $100 of val-
concrete uation; for fire-resistant construction it is $0.12 per
floor 5 $100 of valuation. Rates across the country follow
inches (125 millimeters) thick or a lightweight aggregate
the same pattern.
concrete floor 3 1/2 inches (90 millimeters) thick is ample
for a 2-hour rating.

mit the use of charcoal broilers on balconies; this invites Figure 4.

disaster if the balconies are of combustible construction. Two
Fire-resistant exterior walls. The spread of fire along the different
exterior of the building can be reduced if it has nothing assemblies
to feed upon. Combustible materials and finishes add with the
fuel to a fire and encourage it to find its way into other same fire
rating can
units. Concrete and masonry are well established fire-re-
perform
sistant materials. Concrete walls have essentially the differently in
same fire endurance-thickness relationship as concrete a real fire.
floors (Figure 3). The assem-
Fi re - resistant backup for mansard roofs. The mansard bly at the left failed because of heat transmission; the one
roof is a popular design for apartments and townhouses. at the right because of structural collapse. Collapse is the
It is important to backup the mansard with fire - re s i s- more serious of the two failures; fire ratings make no
tant materials. An effective method is to attach the obvious distinction.
mansard to a concrete or masonry wall. Fi re - re s i s t a n t
roofing materials such as concrete tile are also available
for mansard construction. Figure 5.
Firestopping. Firestopping prevents the free passage of Negative
fire and products of combustion through concealed pressure in
spaces or openings. Firestopping a combustible building a test
furnace
is difficult because there are many concealed spaces and
allows cool
draft openings. Although firestopping is required by air to be
code, it is not always done in practice. Inspecting a drawn into
building for adequate firestopping is difficult. There are the furnace.
far fewer firestopping omissions in concrete and mason- This results
ry construction because less firestopping is needed. in a lower
Thus there are fewer opportunities for error in construc- temperature
tion and fire protection is increased. in the test
assemblage than would occur in a real fire or than would
Significance of fire ratings occur if positive pressure were maintained in the test
What is the significance of fire ratings for building furnace.
construction? It is generally presumed that under actual
fire conditions building components will perform satis- cotton waste; or the test assembly collapses.
factorily for as long as their designated fire ratings. How- Two quite different assemblies with the same fire rat-
e ve r, this is not necessarily true. ings can perform differently in a real fire (Figure 4). Fire
Fire ratings are determined on the basis of exposure to ratings do not tell the whole story and users of fire test
a test fire that raises the temperature at a standard rate reports and fire rating should know this.
until one of three events occurs—the temperature of the Another factor that affects the test results is the pres-
unexposed surface rises an average of 250 degrees F (139 sure in the test furnace. Fire tests in the United States are
degrees C) or 325 degrees F (181 degrees C) at any loca- conducted under negative pressures to ensure removal
tion; sufficient flame or hot gases break through to ignite of toxic gases (in some countries such tests are run un-
der positive pressures). The resulting ratings may be
misleading if they are applied to real fire situations
where positive pressures develop. The negative furnace
p re s s u re allows cool air to be drawn into the furnace
through cracks and other openings, resulting in lower
temperatures and higher fire resistance ratings (Figure
5). Since leakage varies with the assemblage, some as-
semblages benefit from this kind of test more than oth-
ers.
For these reasons and those discussed in the article
“Fire Ratings and Actual Fire Resistance”, it is important
to consider how a specific building assembly might be-
have in an actual fire. More information about fire tests
and ratings is contained in a publication available from
the Portland Cement Association.++
By following these recommendations, good fire pro-
tection can be built into low-rise multifamily residential
buildings. This will help greatly, to prevent fire tragedies
today—and tomorrow.
++ “Significance of Fire Ratings for Building Construction,” Fire Protection
Planning Report, Portland Cement Association, Skokie, Illinois, publication
number SR179.01H, 6 pages.
PUBLICATION#C790591
Copyright © 1979, The Aberdeen Group
All rights reserved