Fire Safety for Leeds pupils from Butler and Young

Butler and Young and Trenton Consultants have provided fire safety solutions to meet Building Regulations, at Allerton High School in Leeds.

The modern open plan design for schools is posing considerable fire safety challenges.

Especially when there are balconies around the 'central street', careful attention needs to be paid to the risk of smoke spreading quickly in the event of a fire.

Chairs, desks and computers placed in parts of the open 'street' for students to use as extensions of their classrooms, also poses a threat.

Such challenges arose in the new GBP23.6m Allerton High School in Leeds, which was recently opened by Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Ed Balls, Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families.

Part of the Government's Building Schools for the Future programme, Allerton High's unusual design featured a central building with four wings, all of which had central streets with balconies above.

The developers wanted to keep the integrity of the design while ensuring people could be evacuated safely.

Butler and Young, commercial building control providers, approved a Fire Engineered solution and acted as the Approved Building Control Inspectors for the project.

Trenton Consultants, one of the leading UK fire consultants, acted as fire engineering consultants.

Trenton Consultants used its expertise to model how smoke would travel and fire spread under different scenarios to work out how to ensure people can escape from the building in safety within predetermined time limits.

A major hazard in any fire is the toxic smoke; it can quickly accumulate, choke people and cause disorientation.

The open areas in the school would allow smoke to spread far more quickly than would a traditional corridor and staircase design.

Trenton Consultants suggested...

- Fire curtains to be installed in the open atrium areas.

dropping down in the event of a fire from the ceiling to each balcony below, effectively sealing those off the atrium space to form enclosed corridors.

- Vents on the glass ceilings to open automatically, drawing hot smoke out, while fans on the ground floor would draw in fresh air to blow the smoke upwards and out of the building.

- Sophisticated hidden sprinklers to be fitted across the school.

Designed to activate when the local temperature around them reaches a certain point, ensuring only the minimum number of sprinklers needed to quell a fire will be set off at any one time.

- Fire alarms to be covered by CCTV which is triggered to record if anyone tampers with the alarms.

Butler and Young advised on ventilation arrangements so the school's unusual open-plan toilets could meet building regulations, without forming the conventional lobby arrangement.

Butler and Young's ability to guide and advise contractors on compliance issues enabled many potential problems and pitfalls to be ironed out in a timely manner, avoiding expensive delays.

Andrew Jones, Senior Design Manager at contractors Interserve Project Services, said, "When you work with an Approved Inspector you have a quite different relationship with them than you would with a building control department of a local authority.

"They regularly attend design team meetings to help minimise abortive design work and Butler and Young in particular very much buy into that philosophy.

"I've worked with them now for a number of years and I find them very good with assisting, guiding and advising you as challenges arise.

Mike Dodds, manager of Butler and Young's Durham office, who project managed the scheme said, "Allerton High School's unusual design, with a main central body and four triangular wings, presented a challenge for fire safety and means of escape, but through good communication and consultation with all parties including the local Fire Authority a satisfactory building was achieved.

"Each section had spacious central streets and "breakout areas" within them where students could study, so the fire risk was more complex than if the school had had a traditional design with corridors and enclosed staircases.

"Butler and Young , working with Trenton Consultants, were able to demonstrate which safety measures needed to be installed to meet building control and fire safety regulations".

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