AYUMI NAKANISHI / ANAKANISHI@STARBULLETIN.COM
Alan Calhoun, captain of Engine 38 Waiau, tested the pressure of fire hoses last month at the Honolulu Fire Department Training Center.
A high-ranking Honolulu Fire Department official has questioned whether internal standpipes are capable of handling water pressure needed to fight fires in high-rise buildings. Oahu high-rises may lack
water to combat firesHFD official says stricter tests on hoses reveals flaws
By Nelson Daranciang
ndaranciang@starbulletin.comStandpipes are built into high-rises so water for hoses can be sent from the ground floor to upper floors.
Battalion Chief Jim Skellington said there are no records indicating that the standpipes were tested according to fire code standards when they were certified by city building inspectors.
He believes the standpipes were instead tested and inspected according to plumbing code, which do not address the higher pressures required of standpipes.
"They didn't have clean enforcement of the fire code in the '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s," Skellington said.
There are no records of the tests because the city was not required to keep those records until five years ago, said Honolulu Fire Chief Attilio Leonardi.
"The Building Department itself doesn't have documentation of initial testing," he said.
The department's fire prevention chief met with city building officials after Skellington filed a complaint, Leonardi said. However, the details of his report will not be released until he meets with Skellington, Leonardi said.
City Department of Planning & Permitting Director Randall Fujiki said he is confident that the standpipes were installed properly.
"While there is no formal documentation, my building inspectors would not have given the building owner a certificate of occupancy if the standpipes were not tested to the proper building code," he said.
Standpipes undergo maintenance tests every five years in which they are subjected to 300 pounds per square inch of water pressure, Leonardi said. Skellington said the maintenance test does not duplicate the initial acceptance test or real-world situations. And, he said, the maintenance tests are performed by private fire protection companies, not the Fire Department.
The Fire Department reviews building plans and is involved in the initial and maintenance tests of the standpipes, but it is the job of city building inspectors to ensure that the standpipes are constructed to proper standards, Leonardi said.
"We have to rely on other departments to do their jobs," Leonardi said.
Skellington thinks that is a cop-out.
"We are the end users of a water delivery system that involves the Building Department and the Water Department. And if we know that one of them isn't doing their job by ensuring that they are built to certain specs or tested certain things, don't you think we would be the first ones that would be concerned? What I'm saying is, that hasn't happened," Skellington said.
"I'm concerned because I have to tell people to go up there and fight," he said.
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The Honolulu Fire Department began testing some of its hoses at higher pressure last month. HFD official says stricter
tests on hoses reveals flawsBy Nelson Daranciang
ndaranciang@starbulletin.comBattalion Chief Jim Skellington complained that the previous test pressure was too low to ensure that the hoses would hold up under enough pressure to fight high-rise fires.
Skellington praised the department for changing the hose test and for issuing new hoses to engine companies assigned to high-rise building areas.
But he said many hoses in use are more than 20 years old. He said one-fourth of the hoses on one of the fire engines in his battalion failed under the higher pressure.
Fire Chief Attilio Leonardi said eight 2.5-inch diameter hoses on Engine 38, in Waiau, maintained the water pressure but showed signs of seepage and were replaced. Of the first 250 lengths of hoses tested under the higher pressures, one burst and another separated from its coupling, he said.
Leonardi said the change to higher test pressure was necessary because newer hoses are designed to withstand higher pressure. But he said no high-rise on Oahu was in jeopardy because the older hoses are strong enough to handle the kind of pressure needed to fight fires in the island's tallest buildings.
The tallest building on Oahu is the 44-story First Hawaiian Center downtown.
Leonardi said the department keeps a hose in service as long as it passes the annual hose test. But he said that practice is under review. He said the department purchased 600 lengths of hoses with a service pressure of 800 pounds per square inch of pressure in May.
Hoses purchased before 1987 have a recommended service pressure of 250 pounds per square inch, but they have a burst pressure of 500 pounds per square inch. The Fire Department was testing all of its hoses at 250 pounds per square inch because according to National Fire Protection Association standards, hoses should be tested at half its burst pressure, Leonardi said.
But when the department began purchasing and using 300 pounds-per-square-inch hoses with a burst pressure rating of 600 pounds per square inch in 1987 and 400 pounds-per-square-inch hoses with a burst pressure rating of 800 pounds per square inch in 1997, it continued to test the hoses at 250 pounds per square inch.
"We should have been testing at a higher pressure," Leonardi said.
Leonardi said Skellington intended to make the Fire Department look bad by raising the issue with an assistant chief, then publicizing his concern the following day without giving the department an opportunity to address it.
Leonardi said, "He didn't give the department any chance to look at his complaint," he said.
Skellington said he did not think the hose test needed to be looked into, just corrected.
Still, Leonardi said he received only one inquiry from a person who lives in a high-rise building.
According to calculations, 250 pounds-per-square-inch pressure on the ground will provide only enough pressure to fight a fire on the 31st floor.
