Fire Sprinkler Facts

Automatic Fire Sprinkler System Facts

Why Use Fire Sprinklers? | Fire Sprinkler Myths| Facts

 

• Automatic fire sprinklers have been in use in North America since 1874.
• Fire sprinklers are widely recognized as the single most effective method for fighting the spread of fires in their early stages – before they can cause severe injury to people and damage to property. When one fire sprinkler head goes off to fight a fire the entire sprinkler system does NOT activate. Sprinklers react to temperatures in individual rooms.
• The chances of a fire sprinkler accidentally going off are extremely remote.
• Installation of fire sprinklers can provide discounts on insurance premiums.
• The costs for installing fire sprinkler systems in buildings 6 to 8 stories high ranges from under a dollar to about $2.00 per square foot in most new construction and from about $1.50 to $2.50 per square foot for retrofitting sprinklers in existing buildings.
• The installation of fire sprinklers in new residential construction is estimated to make up around 1% of the total building cost. (Similar to the cost of new carpet.
• According to the National Fire Protection Association, property damage in hotel fires was 78% less in structures with sprinklers than it was in structures without sprinklers during the years 1983-87. (Average loss per fire was $2,300 in sprinklered buildings and $10,300 in unsprinklered buildings.)
• Nearly half of all hotels and motels, according to a 1988 survey by NFPA, have sprinkler systems.
• NFPA has no record of a fire killing more than two people in a completely sprinklered building where the system was properly operating, except in an explosion or flash fire or where industrial fire brigade members or employees were killed during fire suppression operations.