The investigation is complete into the cause of a fatal hotel fire in the city of Hoover, Alabama last week. The investigation concluded that the fire was accidentally started when the maintenance man, who practiced the Hindu religion, left incense burning in his room while it was unattended. The incense caught his prayer rug on fire. When the maintenance man returned to his room, it was full of smoke. He tried to fight the fire with a portable extinguisher but it malfunctioned. He then tried to phone the front desk clerk to notify the fire department but had to enter two additional rooms to find a working phone. He retrieved another extinguisher but the fire had grown too large by then. The four female, teenage victims were staying in a room on the second floor, above and to the left of the maintenance man's room. The women phoned 911 because they could not exit the room and were trapped. As time passed they told the 911 operator they could hear the water from the fire hoses on the walls but by this time they had retreated to the bathroom and could not exit as the main area of their room was fully involved. They women called their families and one family member has reported to the news that during that call the women said the ceiling was falling in on them. That was the last communication from the women in the room.

The hotel, a Days Inn, was built in 1964. It did not have sprinklers, fire alarms or fire walls in the attic because Alabama law does not require structures of that age to comply with the new laws. It also only had a window on the front, next to the door. There was no other way to exit the room. The walkway used to access the rooms on the second floor was also of wood construction. Since the fire started under and to the right of the room where the women were and the wind was blowing from right to left across the entry/exit door to the room it would have been impossible for the women to exit the room anyway because they were located near the right end of the building and would have had to exit in the direction of the wind driven wall of flames.

At this time the fire has been ruled an accident but the 55 year old maintenance man has been taken into custody and will be deported because he has been living here illegally for two and a half years. No charges are expected to be filed in this case against the maintenance man in regard to the fire.

Many of our members spend allot of time on the road, staying in places that might pose significant difficulties to exit in the case of a fire. My assessment is that without an axe to chop through a wall in a timely manner, anyone in a similar situation would have been doomed to the same fate as these four women.

In the press conference, the consciences of opinion was that had any one of the missing (current) code items been present, the outcome would most probably have been different. The missing items are;

• Working fire alarms in the rooms
• A working sprinkler system
• A second avenue of escape
• A concrete floor on the egress to the rooms above ground level
• Working fire extinguishers

So since we all at some time have stayed or will stay in a motel, please keep the above incident and list in mind when choosing a place to rest for the night. Thanks, Trad

 

Trad, good info., I'm on the road alot, stayed at 3 different motels this last week.

I always look at the room I'm staying in as to "how can I get out" in the case of a fire. I always have my .357 on the nightstand. If at all possible I like to be able to look at the room window to the parking lot and see my cummins.

 

Similar incident happened here a couple years ago at an apartment complex. Wooden staircase/balcony and no other egress. Fire in a lower unit killed the tenants in the upper.