Home Sprinkler Information

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Can you spot the sprinklers?

Residential fire sprinklers provide an immediate action against the growing threat of fire in your home.  Automatic fire sprinklers will provide a quick response to a fire, allow the residents of the home a longer time to evacuate the home and also provide a smaller amount of damage to the home than if the fire went unchecked.

In 2003, approximate loss due to fire was $14.5 billion. The total cost of fire was between $226 and 272 billion, which roughly equates to 2.5% of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP). (NFPA October 2005) Total U.S. annual fire cost in 2003 were more than 30% higher than the total GDP of the largest oil producing country in the world, Saudi Arabia. (NFPA, October 2005) Fire deaths in homes in 2005 totaled 3,030 or 82% of all civilian deaths. There were 396,000 residential structure fires and 13,825 civilian injuries. (NFPA, September 2006)

Installing both smoke alarms and fire sprinklers reduces the risk of fire death in a home by 82% relative to having neither. (Home Fire Sprinkler Coalition) 90% of fires in a residence are contained by the activation of just one sprinkler head. (Home Fire Sprinkler Coalition) Recent research has shown that fire in modern homes smolder longer, then burn hotter and faster than what was typical when smoke alarms were introduced.  The study further concludes that because fire may grow more rapidly, the time needed to escape fire has been reduced from approximately 17 minutes to as little as 3 minutes.  (NIST 2004)

2000-2004 National Fire Protection Association Survey showed that 96% of households had at least one smoke alarm, yet no smoke alarms were present or none operated in almost half (46%) of the reported home fires. (NFPA, 8-13-2007) Fire hoses, on average, use more than 8 ½ times the water than sprinklers to contain a fire (175-200 gallons per minute), residential sprinkler (10-18 gallons per minute). (Home Fire Sprinkler Coalition) Nationally, fire sprinklers add 1% to 1.5% to the cost of construction. (Residential Fire Safety Institute) No reported deaths in residences shown to have a properly operating fire sprinkler system (NFPA). A National poll conducted by Harris Interactive found that over two-thirds (69%) of U.S. homeowners say having a fire sprinkler system increases home value. (Home Fire Sprinkler Coalition)