Ensure your property’s firestopping is effective.
Regardless of whether a property has a sprinkler system, though, one thing every owner should pay attention to is the fire resistance of the building itself.
If a property is new construction, owners have the odds in their favor: New apartment buildings with fire-resistant construction have about 30 percent lower dollar-loss per fire, according to the NFPA. Part of this can be credited to fire-rated building materials. But Keith believes that much of the gain is probably is due to the firewalls that compartmentalize new buildings and thus keep fires confined to smaller areas.
However, a firewall can’t stop a blaze if it has even a single hole. That’s where firestopping comes in. Firestopping means patching a firewall anywhere that it has been breached, whether that breach consists of a hole for wiring or ducts or a gap where the wall meets the ceiling. Firestopping plays a crucial role in stopping the spread of fire and minimizing the loss of life. Ideally, it ensures that the firewalls compartmentalize a building and thus confine the fire to one area long enough for the fire department to arrive and extinguish the flames before they can spread.
If you want your firestopping system to be effective, you have to do more than just plug holes, explains John Sinisi, chairman of Firestop Inspector in Manasquan, N.J., a company that provides third-party inspection of installed firestops and fire barriers. “A firestop system is a recipe system. It consists of specific materials applied to a specified level of depth, depending on the situation.”
These “recipes” are detailed. For example, a system for patching a hole where a cable penetrates a piece of drywall might include a backing material, a caulk, and a collar. Firestopping systems are tested and certified by Underwriters Laboratories, which Sinisi says lists more than 5,000 systems, covering every type of construction.
Even if a building is using the right systems, someone needs to confirm that they are installed correctly. Building codes require that firestopping be inspected, but often they’re somewhat ambiguous on the details of the inspection process.
Once the job is done, it must be maintained over the life of the property. Even a wall that has been carefully firestopped and inspected during construction can lose its effectiveness when electricians, plumbers, or HVAC installers punch holes in it later for repairs or upgrades or by accident. Ongoing inspections will ensure that firewalls get re-sealed so they can do their job.