Automatic Fire Suppression System installations - traditional building conversion to hotels: cost benefit analysis

3. Hotel Fires and their Characteristics

3.1 Introduction

3.1.1 This section considers the characteristics of hotel fires in Scotland over the eleven-year period from 2013/14 to 2023/24. Some data are taken from the SFRS publicly available dataset but much of the analysis relies on individual incident data provided by the SFRS.

3.2 Number of Hotel Fires, Fatalities and Injuries

3.2.1 Publicly available SFRS data shows that there are three main types of building fires:

• Residential dwelling fires (e.g. houses, flats etc) with 4,305 fires in 2022/23.
• Residential ‘other’ fires (e.g. holiday residence, student accommodation etc.) with 377 fires in 2022/23.
• Non-residential fires (e.g. retail, warehousing, education etc.) with, 516 fires in 2022/23.

3.2.2 Fires in hotels/motels are recorded as residential ‘other’ fires within the SFRS incident database. Since 2013/14, the number of residential ‘other’ fires has reduced from 446 to 368^[5] in 2023/24. Details are shown in Table 3.1 which also shows the number of hotel/motel fires in this category.

3.2.3 Across the eleven-year period, there have been 4,395 residential other fires and 777 hotel/motel building fires. Hotel/motel fires represent almost 18% of all fires in this category and average approximately 71 per annum. The number of hotel/motel fires fluctuates from year to year with the number considerably reduced in 2020/21 and 2021/22, reflecting the effects of Covid-19. Since 2021/22, there has been an increase in the number of hotel/motel fires each year with the number of fires in 2023/24 one of the highest number of incidents recorded since 2013/14.

Note that these data exclude chimney and outdoor fires. There were 150 chimney fires and 50 outdoor fires in the hotel/motel category over 2013/14 to 2023/24.

1: This is a provisional figure

3.2.4 The number of fatalities and casualties in hotel/motel fires over the period is shown in Table 3.2. Three fires resulted in six fatalities and 23 incidents resulted in 30 non-fatal casualties (19 incidents with 1 casualty, 3 incidents with 2 casualties and 1 incident with 5 casualties).

3.2.5 Table 3.3 shows the distribution of injuries by severity of injury. Of the 30 injuries, the majority (63%) received first aid at the scene. There was only one serious casualty with a further ten people being hospitalised with slight injuries.

3.2.6 Table 3.4 shows the number of fires across the eleven year period by area of flame and/or heat damage. The majority (87%) of hotel/motel fires sustained either no flame and/or heat damage of less that 5 sq. m. Over the eleven year period, there were six fires (0.8%) which sustained over 1,000 sq. m. of flame and/or heat damage. Across all 777 fires, the average area of flame and/or heat damage was almost 34 sq. m.

3.2.7 The Table also shows the number of fires by area of total damage (flame and/or heat and/or smoke and/or water). Over 30% of hotel/motel fires incurred no damage with a further 43% incurring less than 5 sq. m of total damage. A total of eleven fires (1.4%) incurred damage in excess of 1,000 sq. m. with 3 of these fires in the 5,001 to 10,0000 sq. m. category. Across the 777 fires, the average area of total damage was 77 sq. m.

3.2.8 The majority (59%) of fires over the last eleven years have had one or two appliances in attendance with a further 32% of fires having three or four appliances in attendance. Across all 777 hotel/motel fires, the average number of appliances in attendance was three.

3.2.9 The incident database also records whether there was a safety system present. However, only 26 (3.3%) of the 777 hotel/motel fires between 2013/14 and 2023/4 recorded a safety system as being present. It is understood from SFRS that it is likely that the figures are under recorded due to ambiguous wording in the incident reporting system (IRS) which requires a question which is automatically set to ‘null’ to be changed to ‘yes’ in order for further details such as safety systems to be recorded.

3.2.10 Details of the systems that were present are shown in Table 3.5 which also shows whether the system operated or not. The two most frequently seen systems were sprinklers (six cases) and drenchers (five cases). Of the 26 fires with a safety system, the system operated in 15 (58%) of the cases.

3.2.11 Table 3.6 shows the impact of the safety system on the fire for the 15 cases where the systems operated. The impact on the fire is known for 13 of the 15 cases and in all cases, the fire was either contained/controlled or extinguished.

3.2.12 Table 3.5 shows that there were only six incidents with sprinkler systems and that the system operated in two of the six cases. In both these cases the fire was either contained/controlled or extinguished (Table 3.6). Hence, the systems were very effective in these cases. For the four fires where the system did not operate, the reason for the system not operating was given as ‘other’ for three of the four cases. In the remaining case, the fire was in an area not covered by the system.

3.3 Hotel Fires in Traditional Buildings

3.3.1 Using the approach outlined in paragraph 2.2.5, Table 3.7 shows the distribution of hotel fires by traditional or non-traditional building. There were 17 fires where there was insufficient information available to allocate the fire to a building type. Excluding the 17 fires where there was insufficient information, almost 63% of hotel fires over the last eleven years have been in traditional buildings.

Note:(1) Hotels where there was insufficient information to determine building type have been excluded from the percentage calculation.

3.3.2 Table 3.8 shows the number of fatalities and injuries by building type for the eleven year period 2013/14 to 2023/24. The Table shows that the six fatalities in hotel fires since 2013/14 have all been in traditional buildings and the majority of injuries (73%) have also been in traditional buildings.

Note: Slight injuries are defined as those admitted to hospital with slight injuries and those receiving first aid.

3.3.3 Table 3.9 shows the average area of fire damage (flame and/or heat) and total damage (flame and/or heat and/or smoke and/or water) by building type and all hotels. Under both measures of damage, the average area of damage was slightly lower in traditional hotels compared to all hotels. This may be a reflection of the general size of non-traditional hotels with many providing several hundred rooms.

Notes: (1) includes hotels where there was insufficient information to allocate them to a building type.

3.3.4 In terms of the number of appliances attending the incident, Table 3.10 provides details. There is very little difference between the building types with the majority of incidents having one or two appliances in attendance. Across all hotels and traditional buildings, the average number of appliances in attendance is three.

Notes: (1) includes hotels where there was insufficient information to allocate them to a building type.

3.3.5 Table 3.5 showed that there were 26 fires with a safety system present. Table 3.11 shows that twelve of these fires were in traditional buildings. There were only two fires in traditional buildings with sprinkler systems and the system did not operate in either case.

3.4 Probability of Hotel Fires, Fatalities and Casualties

3.4.1 One of the key issues for this study is whether there is a greater incidence of fires in hotels in traditional buildings compared to fires in non-traditional buildings. Table 3.12 shows the probability of hotel fire occurring by building type. This was calculated using the average number of hotel fires per annum by building type and the total stock of hotels by building type. The Table shows the probability of a hotel fire occurring in a year is 3.5%. When looking at building type, the probability of a hotel fire in a traditional building is slightly lower than in a non-traditional building – 3.1% compared to 4.2%.

3.4.2 Table 3.13 also shows the probability of a fatality or casualty occurring given that there is a hotel fire, by building type. While the probability of a hotel fire occurring in a traditional building is slightly lower than for a non-traditional building, the probability of being killed or injured in a fire in a traditional building is higher than for a non-traditional building.

3.4.3 This suggests that while there is a slightly lower chance of a fire occurring in a traditional building, when a fire does occur there is a greater chance of injury and fatality.