From BBC Scotland today:

A man has died in a fire at a block of flats in Edinburgh. Four fire engines and a height appliance were dispatched to the blaze in Calder Gardens at about 00:45.

Crews were able to extinguish the blaze, but a 56-year-old man was pronounced dead at the scene. No one else was injured in the incident and the building did not have to be evacuated.

None of the media have sought to link this to Grenfell for obvious reasons.

Why was there not a Grenfell incident?

For any new readers and folk you might share with:

In the Herald today from Martin Williams, the man with a ferry newsletter, the above disgraceful image and then this:

Ministers have been accused of putting lives at risk after it emerged it has overseen the removal of dangerous cladding of just one building seven years after the Grenfell Tower blaze that claimed the lives of 72 people.

Who has accused the ministers? A trade union fighting in the interests of its members, as staffing is reduced but by a far lesser extent than fire incidents are plummeting. Just doing what they should but NOT evidence of anything other than that.

So, once more, the facts:

From BBC Glasgow & West [25/9/22]:

Firefighters have extinguished a blaze which broke out at a tower block in the south side of Glasgow.

Emergency services were alerted to the incident in Shawhill Road, Shawlands, at about 21:00 on Saturday.

The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service dispatched eight fire engines. Large plumes of smoke were seen coming from windows on the block’s upper floors.

The fire was reported as extinguished after 22:00. It is understood there were no reported casualties.https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-63023916

Why did this fire not spread to other floors and with terrible consequences?

Simple: Cavity Fire Barriers.

What?

These:

Reader Gordon Darge wrote for us in January 2020:

As a chartered architect in Scotland for 40 years I can confirm that the Building Regulations Technical Standards Scotland have for two decades required cavity fire barriers

2.4 Cavities
Mandatory Standard
Standard 2.4
Every building must be designed and constructed in such a way that in the event of an outbreak of fire within the building, the spread of fire and smoke within cavities in its structure and fabric is inhibited.

This includes for example, around the head, jambs and sill of an external door or window opening, at all floor levels and building corners etc. to prevent the spread of fire in building cavities. This would have prevented the spread of the fire at Grenfell Tower.

This is difficult and expensive to achieve and I can only guess that in England they did not follow the Scottish model because Westminster and the Tories were led by the vested interests of big business, property developers and large construction firms.

For anyone wanting more info see:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/building-standards-technical-handbook-2019-domestic/2-fire/2-4-cavities/

Cavity fire barriers prevent this:

The Chimney Effect

As I understand it, it is not so much the flammability of the material used as the construction of the external cladding to deny the spread of fire via a chimney effect.

They worked in a tower fire in 2021 which was contained within one floor and had no casualties:

According to BBC Scotland:

Residents of a multi-storey block of flats in Glasgow had to be evacuated after a fire broke out on the 17th floor. Fire crews were called to the block on Lincoln Avenue in the Knightswood area of the city at 04:08. Residents were safely removed from the building by the fire service and there were no casualties. A total of nine fire appliances attended the incident which took about five hours to bring under full control. A spokeswoman for Scottish Fire and Rescue Service said: “Operations control mobilised nine appliances to Lincoln Avenue where the fire was affecting the 17th floor of the multi-storey block of flats.” The spokeswoman said residents from the 17th and 18th floors were removed and the fire has been extinguished.

No towering inferno. Never!