1401 S. 18th St., Renton, WA - Apartment/Urban-Wildland Fire

[Guest]

Awesome shots.

[Bryce]

Sorry Taylor, master connected fire alarm box, through a Gamewell system.

There's none of those in Renton. I'd say based on Brian's pictures the building only had an alarm system -- probably no sprinklers.

[Guest]

 

Gotcha!  The only exposure I have to Gamewell system (or anything even like it) is from what I've seen on the interwebs, so even after 20 years of fire service experience, that portion of it is still foreign to me.

 

It's too bad most of the left coast never took advantage of, or got rid of, Gamewell fire alarm systems. A master box is a direct connection between a building fire alarm system and a municipal fire department. So if a smoke detector activates, a signal is sent direct to the FD. Just imagine how much time that saves, especially in an unoccupied building in the middle of the night.

Instead of a signal going to an alarm company (not the most reliable interface) or hoping someone sees smoke and calls 911, then goes through seemingly endless, silly questions, the FD knows almost instantly there is a fire.

[gmuhr]

Great photos.

[Guest]

I lived in these apartments for 1 year back in 2009, The next building down from these actually.

 

The fire building was 1401 and I lived at 1301...

 

There were no sprinklers even though the units were rebuilt a few months before I moved in.

 

They were rebuilt from the ground up, but somehow the complex was able to find some building loophole that allowed them to rebuild without updating the fire suppression system.

 

I bought fire extinguishers for EVERY room including the bathroom and even bought an emergency escape ladder!

 

It doesn't look like any of those things would have helped if my unit ever caught fire... 

 

My unit was at greater risk too because of the 6 garages below the apartments.

 

One car fire and those things were gone!

 

I'm glad I got out of that complex!