Dozens of firefighters have been fighting a huge fire in a parking garage under the Velderwoude apartment complex on Haverleij in Den Bosch since Wednesday morning. This arose after a man became unwell and crashed his car into a wall in the garage. Extinguishing a fire in such a parking garage is a difficult operation, explains Marcel Koene of the Netherlands Fire Department. “The smoke and heat have nowhere to go.”
Koene is an expert in the field of fire safety in parking garages. The firefighter has already assessed many parking garages for fire safety. He explains that the fire brigade must proceed carefully in the event of a parking garage fire: “Hazardous and toxic substances are released, as with any fire. But the smoke and heat cannot go anywhere.”
The fire brigade’s clothing offers protection, but it is not endless. “The clothing cannot withstand those toxic substances for long. After half an hour it penetrates through your suit and through your skin.”
And even if the suits offered enough protection against the toxic substances and the heat, the fire brigade would not be able to enter the garage in Den Bosch. Parts of the structure, such as pieces of concrete and metal, could become loose and fall down. “In the worst case, you have to wait until a car has burned out before you can enter,” says Koene.
According to Koene, one car fire lasts on average about half an hour. In the case of the fire in Den Bosch, dozens of cars caught fire. The more cars there are in such a garage, the greater the risk of fire.
Since January 1, an automatic extinguishing system has been mandatory in a parking garage under new-build apartments. There was no such installation in the case of the 2001 complex in Den Bosch, a spokesperson for the Safety Region said.
Whether such an automatic extinguishing system should be installed depends on many factors. “It applies to parking garages that are larger than a thousand square meters. The average parking garage under a residential building does not achieve that. It is actually a gap in the regulations,” says Koene.
An extinguishing system can prevent worse. “Such an installation can often extinguish the fire. And if that fails, the situation will at least remain under control,” Koene explains.
In addition to an extinguishing system, there are other measures that can prevent or delay fires. “For example, you can make a fire-resistant separation every four cars, so that the fire cannot spread further. But then this can be at the expense of the feeling of safety, because you no longer have an overview of the entire parking garage,” says Koene.
It is not yet clear whether there were electric cars in the garage in Den Bosch, according to the Safety Region. Koene does see that those cars cause bigger problems if they burn in a parking garage. “A battery of an electric car can burn for up to 74 hours, says the fire expert. “Such a car must be placed in an immersion tank. If an electric car burns on the street, it is less serious. But that is difficult in a parking garage.”
Residents had to quickly leave their homes due to the fire on Wednesday morning:
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