Fire is a social equality issue. Amid fresh concerns over rogue landlords and dangerous overcrowding, why have calls for change gone unheeded for so long?
In June 2023, a fire started at this e-bike shop in New York City and spread to upper floors of the building.
AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews
Lithium-ion batteries power many electric cars, bikes and scooters. When they are damaged or overheated, they can ignite or explode. Four engineers explain how to handle these devices safely.
Generators should not be used in confined and poorly ventilated spaces.
Shutterstock
The early symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning include headaches or dizziness, breathlessness, nausea, tiredness, chest and stomach pains and visual problems.
Residents have long bemoaned measures taken to make buildings look better, but not safer.
Ajit Wick | Shutterstock
Since the Grenfell Tower fire claimed 72 lives in 2017, Australia has identified flammable cladding on more than 3,400 buildings. Despite apartment owners’ fears and rising costs, few have been fixed.
Sensors in smoke detectors monitor how particles in the air affect a flow of current to the battery.
Garrett Aitken/iStock via Getty Images
Weak regulation and a lack of mandatory inspections have increased fire risks for the one in four homes with rooftop PV panels. Here’s what we need to do to be safer.
A late season fire in Bwabwata National park.
Conor Eastment
The public inquiry into Grenfell makes its first report – but those responsible for the circumstances leading up to the fire are yet to face the consequences.
Focus on the fire service.
John Gomez/Shutterstock.
It will take time to digest the details of the 830-plus page report from phase one of the inquiry, but there are clear improvements to be made.
The materials used for cladding buildings can greatly affect a building’s overall vulnerability to fire. In Australia, buildings with flammable cladding continue to pose safety concerns.
SHUTTERSTOCK
Ensuring a building will be safe against fire requires careful consideration from not only fire engineers, but also from builders, architects and building owners.
The crisis of confidence in the safety and soundness of new apartment buildings won’t end without a decisive response from federal, state and territory governments.
David Crosling/AAP
Unsafe apartments are being evacuated as confidence plummets – even the author of a report commissioned by building ministers wouldn’t buy a new apartment. What will it take for governments to act?
Government ministers responded to the construction industry crisis by announcing a national approach to implementing recommendations of a report they commissioned in 2017 and received 17 months ago.
Bianca De Marchi/AAP
The construction industry crisis didn’t happen overnight. Authorities have been on notice for years to fix the problems that now have the industry itself calling for better regulation.
The Mascot Towers building in Sydney’s inner south is cordoned off after residents were evacuated following the discovery of cracks in the building.
Bianca De Marchi/AAP
Regulations that are meant to protect residents from building failures and fires have been found wanting. All governments must take responsibility for fixing the defective regime they created.
Grenfell Tower, one year after the fire.
Carcharoth/Wikimedia Commons.
Estimated costs for Victoria alone range from hundreds of millions to as much as $1.6 billion If work to rectify buildings fitted with combustible cladding isn’t well handled.
A lot of chemical reactions happen in the very short time it takes to light a match.
Shutterstock
I have been interested in the science of fire and fireworks for a long time, and can tell you there is a lot happening in the very short time it takes to light a match.
The burden of regulatory failure hasn’t just hit residents of evacuated apartments like the Neo200 building in Melbourne – it affects everyone living in a building with serious defects.
Ellen Smith/AAP
Years of regulatory failure are having direct impacts on the hip pockets of the many Australians who bought defective houses or apartments. It’s turning into a multibillion-dollar disaster.
Associate Professor, Department of Environmental and Geographical Science and African Climate and Development Initiative Research Chair, University of Cape Town
Wildfire Specialist at the University of California Cooperative Extension; Adjunct Professor Bren School of Environmental Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara