Ear on Chicago; Fire Show

Oh, hear me out there. We're going to start the demonstration in just a minute. There's a few remarks I want to make at this time. This is being put on as a part of the Fire Prevention Week campaign sponsored by the Chicago Association of Commerce. Illinois Institute of Technology, of course, is participating in this. I also want to mention that the instrumentation is being supplied by Armory Research Foundation. I will explain that to you in just a moment. That was Professor John Aher in of the Fire Protection and Safety Engineering Department at Illinois Tech. He was speaking to the gathered crowd at the Illinois Tech's campus through a portable public address unit. The past week was Fire Prevention Week in Chicago. Illinois Tech played a dramatic part in the demonstrations during this week. Together with the Chicago Association of Commerce and Industry who sponsored Fire Prevention Week, Illinois Tech burned two buildings on the Illinois Tech campus. But let's listen to Professor Aher.

Now there is to what we are going to do. We have two identical buildings. These buildings came from the railroad fair. They are made of five eighths inch plywood on two by four studying. We purposely selected buildings which were a very flimsy construction. First to show you that the untreated one is going to burn rather rapidly. We hope. And also to give you an idea of what you might expect from a fire protective coating on even a very flimsy structure. The building which is untreated, the one on your right, has been painted with an oil -based paint. The building on your left, which is the treated building, has been painted with LBR, fire retardant paint, fire protective coating. On the inside and on the outside, it has

been painted with LBR 99, which is an exterior product for use on the outside. The only difference in the two buildings, and one which we were not too pleased about, is that the treated building has a tire paper covering on the roof. There is no covering on the untreated building. And as far as the untreated building is concerned, the parent doesn't make too much difference. The tire paper on the roof of the treated building may give us a little trouble, and may possibly give results that we didn't anticipate. We have no way of determining that in advance. The instrumentation, when you'll see in the rear, that which was supplied by our research foundation, consists of this type of a setup. There are thermal couples in the right -hand upper

corner of each building, directly over the greater portion of the debris. That is going to give us temperature readings on the interior of the building near the ceiling. There are also thermal couples on the outside of the building on the roof, so that we can get temperature readings on the outside surface, or at least as close as possible, we want to see what insulating quality there is. Now, as far as the fire load is concerned, they are identical in each building. We set the original load of the building up on skits to simulate an industrial situation. There is a crate in each one which is loaded with excels here. Then there are three cardboard cartons also loaded with excels here. And in addition, we put in two bales of straw. I believe we should get a pretty good fire out of the result.

In addition, we're going to add one gallon of a drain oil. It's not gasoline, it's an oil. To make sure that it gets off to a good start. The crowd was made up mostly of students and firemen. We did recognize, however, a deputy commissioner of the Fire Department, Chief Malini and Fire Commissioner of Chicago, Mr. Corrigan. Jim Springer and I were also there, and this is what happened as we saw it. As we look around us here on 34th and Dearborn, we see on one corner the old mecha flats, the former site of the mecha building, one of the most modern apartments back in the 1800s. So right here, we see on the other corner, a temporary building which now houses the home economics department of Illinois Tech. The agglity across from the two buildings which are to be burned this afternoon, we see the old school which at one time was the school made up completely of children from the mecha flats. Straight across 34th Street, we see the

new modern building, part of Illinois Tech's campus, of the Institute for Gas Technology. So within this four corners here, we see all sorts of buildings, including the former site of the mecha, which was at one time one of the worst slums in Chicago's history, and has been wrecked about a year now. Frank, you might mention that the mecha in itself, the one building was the entire 27th precinct of this ward. You really want to make certain these buildings will burn ferociously. They're filling them with straw, cardboard cartons, and other waste materials. So when they light them, these buildings won't stand much of a chance against the fire. They're backing the crowd up now. We're being forced to move back here too by the officials. The fire department is taking no chances with this little demonstration today. They have a large fire hose with about four firemen hanging onto it for dear life, ready to go at any minute. They're pushing the crowd back now, again. And I think they're just about ready to start the fire.

Right now we have Professor Lobby's of the fire protection and safety engineering department pouring the crankcase oil. I think, believe that's what it is, isn't it? Well, it is a drain oil, lubricating oil used in industrial plants quite a bit, and it has a flashpoint much lower than that of gasoline. And so it would simulate a situation which is fairly common in industry. That of buildings and floors being soaked with a material which is not as inflammable of gasoline, but which still will support and add actively to a fire. Now two of the firemen over by the fire building are lighting a torch, which is a rag soaked in oil. Both buildings have been soaked in the oil now and they're about ready to start, seem to be having a little bit of trouble, getting that torch to start burning. Now it's going now. It might be interesting to add here too, Jim, that the site of this fire in the former Mecca building is going

to be used as part of Technology Center's expansion. It's a $40 million project, and wait, here we go again. Now, Professor Ahearn is putting the torch in the pile of straw in the coated building. Now he's moving over to the uncoated building, the unprotected building, and starting the fire in the second building. The fire in the first building seems to have developed rapidly. There's a very large amount of open flame now. The flames are almost to the ceiling of the first building. Professor Ahearn is making sure that both buildings are well -ignited. The straw in the second building has been ignited in three places and is spread now till it is enveloped almost half the pile of straw. And I think in a little while we're going to be moving back because the flames are coming right out towards us here. The smoke is pouring out of the buildings. The oils and straw combined have produced quite a ferocious blaze. There is a great deal more smoke coming out of the protected building than there is out of the unprotected building. Getting darn hot here too.

It's very hot here now. We're trying to move back as far as we can and still see the blade. The protective coating, the value of the coating, is quite apparent now. The inside of the unprotected building is nothing but a mass of flame. While there are still unburned and unscored portions of the protected building. As we're over there now, I know that the temperature reading is quite high because we're here and we feel a temperature of past 100 degrees. The fire is burst through the rough of the unprotected building now while it is still just licking at the walls of the protective building. Now the smoke is very much thicker. Thick black smoke coming not just from the fuel oil, but from the coatings on the roughs of the buildings I imagine. I think it's interesting to note, Jim, that the flames and the uncoated building, building coated with regular paint. And I'd say our 10 times more ferocious than the others. The protected building is still

containing the fire. It hasn't burst through the outside walls at all. While the flames from the unprotected building are shooting out 15 to 20 feet. The untreated building, by the way, Jim, told me about that. The paint on the outside of the untreated building is just beginning to blister while on the treated building, I can't see for the smoke too well here. Now on the untreated building, the sides are beginning to blacken and it looks as if the fire will burst through at any moment. Smoke is now coming from the sides of that building through holes which have appeared. The flame is just burst through the sides of the untreated building. While there's nothing but a little blistered paint on the sides of the treated building. The fire doesn't seem to be going through the walls of the treated building, but creeping around the edges. The entire south wall of the untreated

building is in flames now. It's nothing but a few wood studs standing. Now all the walls have burned away and there's nothing but the studs on fire. The wood studding, the walls are completely gone now. Right now we can see right through the buildings and see the engineers working in back on the potentiometers back there reading the temperatures. The firemen are all standing ready here just in case something might happen. The firemen have been called into play now. They've just opened up their spray nozzles here. They're using fog on this particular fire. Firefighting fog is water spray divided into a very fine mist rather than a straight stream. The steam and the smoke from the fire have completely eclipsed our view, which is in itself a good sign that the fire is pretty well under control. Professor Ainer has just got lost in the smoke. There he's coming out again. The smoke is terrific. I think if we move back a little we might not be lost in here.

The wind is coming directly from the fire toward us and we're getting a face full of the fire fog, the little bit of water mist and all the smoke. Now the smoke is cleared away and the firemen have stopped leaving nothing but a few puddles of mud around the building and no fire at all. People behind there which I think I'm getting wet. They're using a different method on this untreated building. They're using a direct hose stream rather than the fog. And the power of the hose stream is apparent because it is literally breaking the weak and timbers in half. These hose streams are very powerful, which is evidenced by the fact that it takes four firemen to control one. Right now we can see what's left of these two buildings at the present time. The firemen are still working on the untreated building which is left. There are available rooms, there's nothing but a slight skeleton while there's still a shell, there's still the other building standing.

Right now they're trying to clear away as much as the fire and put out as much as possible on the untreated building. They did put out as much of the fire as possible and soon the crowd began leaving but we waited to get the temperature data from the engineers. Jim talked to these people from Armour Research Foundation and found that the outside temperature of the untreated building was 2000 degrees. While the treated building had only temperature of 1900. Inside temperatures differed even more, the untreated building, having the temperature of 475, while the treated building had only 185 degrees. These readings were for the first five minutes after the fire started. After Professor Aheron spoke to both Chief Malaney and Commissioner Corrigan, Jim spoke to Professor Aheron. Professor Aheron is still rather busy but maybe I can get him to say a few words now, the excitement has died down. Okay Jim, I think the test worked out very well, we showed very graphically what

could be done with a fire protective coating. We showed a difference of almost 400 degrees on the exterior surfaces of the material that was coated. And also after the fire was put out and the wall was scraped, you were able to see that the finish inside had not been particularly damaged. Once you scraped off the puffiness of the fire protective coating, it was an extremely severe fire load and the result I believe shows that there can be a great deal done by protecting combustible materials with a good fire protective coating. Take the other one of this type that gives you some insulating qualities. I think that about covers it Jim. You've just heard a special program from the site of the burning of two buildings on the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology. It was part of our coverage of the demonstrations during Fire Prevention Week. This is Frank Lewoski speaking together with Jim Springer.