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Most Carrboro apartments have no sprinklers

Posted on October 25, 2007October 25, 2007 by Staff

 

By Kate Newnam
Carrboro Commons, Editor

Week after week, the Carrboro Fire-Rescue Department takes the time to go out into the community and stress the importance of fire safety and prevention. And week after week, the information goes in one ear and out the other of many of the people they are trying to educate.

“We go out there, and most [people] don’t take it serious because they think it won’t happen to them,” said Carrboro Fire Chief Travis Crabtree.

Yet it did happen to the residents of the G building of Colonial Village at Highland Hills. Early in the morning of Sept. 30, tenants awoke to their apartment building quickly being consumed by flames and smoke.

“G-2, they were woken by a neighbor banging on their door, and said the time was 1:38 then,” said Crabtree. “We didn’t even get [the call and] dispatched until 1:59.”

By the time the fire department received the call at 1: 59 — 21 minutes after the blaze was first discovered — four units of the building were already aflame. Firefighters arrived on the scene only four minutes after getting the call. Crabtree said, “That was all in the a.m., so luckily there was no traffic or lights to slow us down. So that’s about as good as we can do.”

Why had it taken so long for the fire department to get the call?

“I think the residents were in such shock that it was actually happening that time just got away from them,” Crabtree said.

When the fire was finally contained, an entire building lay in ruins, one woman was dead and two residents were sent to the hospital after jumping to safety from their apartment.

In the aftermath of such a devastating event, the importance of fire safety precautions is fresh in the minds of Carrboro residents and those who protect them. The absence of a sprinkler system in the Highland Hills building has led many apartment dwellers to check up on the safety measures in place in their own buildings and develop their own fire plans. Crabtree’s advice to the public: Don’t assume protection is there.

Multifamily homes constructed prior to 1981 were not required to build in automatic sprinkler systems. This includes the majority of Carrboro apartment complexes.

According to Crabtree, most of the apartments in town that do have them are ones that were rebuilt after similar fire tragedies.

Although lacking sprinklers, the complexes do have smoke alarms and fire safety plans.
Dan Vogel, manager of the Chateau Apartments on Hwy. 54, said the staff checks the smoke alarms every 90 days and replaces them every three years. After the fire, they walked through and checked windows to make sure they opened properly and made notes telling residents not to block their windows. They also encourage tenants to purchase renter’s insurance to cover some costs in the event that there is a fire or other damage.

“We keep brochures here in the office and really do try to tell them that $20,000 worth of insurance usually won’t cost more than $200 a year,” said Vogel. “You try to push it, but in the end it’s up to the individual.”

Of the 12 occupied units in the Highland Hills building, Crabtree knew of only one that was covered by renter’s insurance.

“It won’t replace like for like, but at least it’s something,” he said.

A tenant of the Brewer Lane apartments, UNC-Chapel Hill student Aaron Alexander, said he had never heard about renter’s insurance from his apartment management. Like many in the area, the complex requires their residents to be responsible for their own insurance and fire safety.

“We have to check our smoke alarms on our own, so after I heard about the fire it reminded me to make sure they were working,” said Alexander. “I was definitely not concerned before.”

Crabtree encourages everyone to be proactive in their safety measures. Some measures to take are:

  • Have a fire plan and be sure to include a secondary means of evacuation.
  • Be sure smoke alarms are working. They should be tested every month and batteries should be changed every six months. Any alarm more than ten years old should be replaced.
  • Purchase a fire extinguisher and know how to use it.
  • If not on the ground floor, buy a rope ladder for use in case doors are blocked. They are available at most hardware stores and come in different lengths depending on your story level.
  • Make sure your address is clearly visible to fire personnel from the road.

For more information on fire precautions and the safety services offered by the Carrboro Fire-Rescue Department, visit their website at www.carrborofire.org.

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