Report of the technical investigation of The Station nightclub fire

Abstract

Disclaimer Certain commercial entities, equipment, products, or materials are identified in this document in order to describe a procedure or concept adequately or to trace the history of the procedures and practices used. Such identification is not intended to imply recommendation, endorsement, or implication that the entities, products, materials, or equipment are necessarily the best available for the purpose. Disclaimer The policy of NIST is to use the International System of Units (metric units) in all publications. In this document, however, units are presented in metric units or the inch-pound system, whichever is prevalent to the discipline. Conversion tables are provided in this report. Disclaimer The NIST-led investigation of The Station Nightclub fire was conducted during the same time period as civil and criminal legal actions involving the same incident, which limited the Team's access to physical evidence and limited the ability to interview many witnesses. Use in Legal Proceedings No part of any report resulting from a NIST investigation can be used in any suit or action for damages arising out of any matter mentioned in such report (15 USC 281a; as amended by P.L. 107-231).

Experimental analysis of the effectiveness of emergency signage and its implementation in evacuation simulation

“…As a result, the actual effectiveness of wayfinding signage systems may be far from ideal. This has been demonstrated in previous disasters [10][11][12] as well as in experimental studies [8,9,13].…”

A two‐step method for predicting time to flashover in room corner test fires using cone calorimeter data

“…However, it should be noted that materials in Category 4 have times to flashover less than 120 s, which is sometimes less than the required safe egress time in typical building fires. An example of such a fire scenario is the The Station Nightclub of 2003 [7], in which 100 people lost their lives. The polyurethane foam lining the walls and ceiling of the nightclub caught fire, and the onset of the flashover was approximately at 60 s [7,8].…”

“…An alternative approach is to make use of mathematical models to evaluate building materials. Advanced mathematical models including flame spread are capable of predicting the time to flashover in ISO 9705 room corner fire test [5,6] and additional atmospheric properties in complex fire scenarios [7,8]. However, it is still desirable to understand the key factors that affect the fire properties of the material of interest in a relatively simple way.…”

Representing egress data

“…This was developed through examining a range of existing methods used to represent event activities, for example, storyboards, schematics, notation systems and so on. [25][26][27]29] The timeline notation developed is shown in Figure 7.…”