Characteristic Analysis of Four Major Nighttime Fire Cases on Fire Safety of Long-Term Care Institutions Using Fire Protection Defense-In-Depth Strategy

Abstract

Providing high-quality care services and fire safety for long-term care institutions is an important issue in Taiwan, which became an aging society in 2018. The fire incidents in Taiwan over the years show that nighttime fires in care institutions often cause serious casualties. It is necessary not only to understand the causes of serious nighttime fire incidents that have occurred but also to draw lessons from the fires that have been put out without causing injuries. In this study, the top two serious nighttime fire accidents in long-term care institutions in the past two decades in Taiwan were analyzed based on the publicly official and academic literature utilizing fire protection defense-in-depth strategies. For comparison, two other nighttime fire cases with similar scenarios but no casualties were also analyzed in depth about the cause of no casualties. The buildings of the four nighttime fires were equipped with fire protection equipment in their public areas. The theoretical basis of the research is the fire protection defense-in-depth strategy. In both categories of severe casualties and no severe casualties, one was caused by arson and the other one by an electrical fire, with the ignition point of a fire in the storeroom and the other in the ward. However, the end results were quite different. The analyzed results showed that the severe fires lasted for about an hour, while the fires without casualties were put out within 15 min. A well-constructed second layer of defense measures could effectively contain a fire, and an effective third layer of measures could avoid casualties. The death rate of personnel can be reduced from a dozen to zero, and the burning time is also greatly reduced. The results could be used as a reference for emergency measures in long-term care institutions.