Gulf Construction Online - Dubai takes the lead in safety regulations

Security & Safety

Dubai takes the lead in safety regulations

UK-based Wrightstyle, one of Europe’s most innovative steel glazing specialists, looks at Dubai’s changing attitude towards fire regulations and its own role in ensuring safety of buildings.

01 August 2006

Something life-enhancing is happening in Dubai, the trendsetter for the rest of the region, and is sure to happen elsewhere in the Middle East: The scale of development there has fuelled a sea-change in official attitudes towards the vital issue of enforcing fire safety regulations.

A recent article in Dubai’s Gulf News estimated that the booming emirate is home to 24 per cent of the world’s cranes – that is 30,000 cranes out of 125,000 worldwide. A less ambitious claim might be somewhere between six and 10 per cent.
Whatever the real figure, development statistics are staggering for Dubai, which has seen its population size grow from 183,000 in 1970 to 1.1 million now and where, according to HSBC bank estimates, some $42.5 billion in being invested in construction projects.
Having opened the property market to foreign investors and also recognizing the need to protect the mega-structures that have been, and are being, built has resulted in one hugely positive outcome: Dubai has begun to seriously enforce fire safety regulations. Until now, despite having building regulations that promised much, little was done to make sure that proper protection was built into the fabric of buildings.
By law, architects and developers in Dubai are responsible for implementing fire safety and building regulations. However, in a bewilderingly fast market, the building sector has been beset by two factors – price and the need to build quickly. With investment in new buildings sometimes changing hands several times during the construction phase, there was – and is – huge pressure on contractors and sub-contractors to cut corners.
Until now, when architects specified that a particular area should be fire protected by suitable glazing systems or fire doors, the contractor would sometimes install an untested and non-certified system, and simply submit a false fire test certificate. Like others in the sector, Wrightstyle would sometimes discover that its test certification was being used to endorse a system that it hadn’t supplied, which wasn’t fit for purpose and, worse, would rapidly and catastrophically fail in a real fire situation.
However, the problem isn’t simply confined to sub-standard systems. There are many differing aspects affecting the compliance of fire-rated glazing; for example, a fire test that covers a single piece of glass, of a certain size and fixed into concrete, would not cover a multiple run of glazing, particularly if the glass was installed in a different framing system. Fire test certification must be specific if it is to hold any validity, and must cover both the glass and the framing system that supports it.
As a responsible supplier to the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) market, Wrightstyle has responded in two ways. First, to ensure that design proposals for fire resistance being submitted to architects and consultants are fit for purpose, as well as compliant with performance criteria, the company now offers a free evaluation service. This covers all submitted drawings and test certification that are being used to support either the framing system or the proposed glass.
Second, to further aid the architect and consultant, Wrightstyle now only issues project-related test certification. In other words, when its fire-resistant systems are used, the test report will refer to that particular project, and will only be valid for the named building. This once-only test certification reduces the chance of illegal or unsuitable test reports being used to support non-compliant installations.
A sign that things are changing for the better is the announcement that Bodycote Warringtonfire has entered into an agreement with the Dubai Civil Defence (DCD) authority, to establish a centre for excellence for fire-safety testing and the approval of products in Dubai. This facility, being built at the DCD’s own training centre, will be open for business next year.
Already, that announcement and the sea change in enforcement attitudes that have led to it, are having a profound effect on how products and systems being specified and test certificates are ratified. In the past few months, Wrightstyle has been approached by a growing number of specifiers, particularly for its fully glazed two-hour fire doors and screens, requesting project-by-project fire test certification.
Those specific requests represent a huge step forward, because it now means that the fire test certification for individual projects is now valid. In the event of a fire, fire doors and glazing systems will perform as designed.
Companies such as Wrightstyle put enormous resources behind developing and, more importantly, testing their systems. Wrightstyle’s glazing and door systems do protect against fire and blast because, using independent companies such as Warringtonfire, it has put them into furnaces or tried to blow them up.
In the past, in Dubai and elsewhere, Wrightstyle has been disadvantaged by contractors compromising on safety to save money, using systems that look good on paper but which have not been through rigorous and independent testing processes. As in so many other fields, Dubai is wisely showing a better way forward: that when it comes to fire safety, human life is beyond price.