••••A••HISTORY••OF••DISASTER•••

In September 1991, a fire occurred in a chicken processing factory constructed from
insulated panel, located in North Carolina. Of the 90 staff present at the time of the blaze, 25 were killed and a further 54 injured.

The most notorious fire in the UK involving EPS insulated panel occurred at the premises of Sun Valley Poultry Limited in Hereford on September 1993. Two fire fighters were killed as a result of the insulated panel ceiling collapsing and poor visibility. The British Home Office commissioned a report into the fire safety of insulated panel.

The most widely publicised fire involving EPS in New Zealand occurred at the Christchurch premises of Ernest Adams Limited in February 2000. The majority of the building was constructed from EPS. One of the New Zealand Fire Service reports that summarised the investigation of the fire incident concluded that ‘the sustained elevated temperatures in the flue assembly were sufficiently high for a fire to occur in the polystyrene [core of the PIP roof panels] and that there was a sufficiently high energy release rate from the flue for this fire to be self sustaining until the fire had grown in size for its own heat release rate to be self sustaining’.

The building was totally destroyed. Four fire fighters were injured. Two Fire Service personnel were injured as they exited a large roof/ceiling void where the fire initially took hold, while a further two received injuries when a section of ceiling collapsed.

Afterwards the New Zealand Fire Service recommended that personnel should not attempt fire fighting within burning EPS buildings. The Service recommends that rescue entry should only be attempted in extraordinary circumstances, suggesting that ‘successful rescue…is extremely unlikely'.

The Fire Research and Development Group of the British Home Office commissioned a report which studied the fire fighting options for fires involving insulated panel. This was deemed necessary because ‘there [was] a clear unusual risk to fire fighters who may have to enter such an [EPS] building on fire’.