Gold Strike fire alarm functioned properly

18.06.1998, Lesen Sie hier den Bericht über «Gold Strike fire alarm functioned properly».

Officials look for the cause of a fire and are focusing on why a resort's sprinkler system gave out.

By Glenn Puit / Review-Journal



Cleanup crews continue to work Wednesday at the Gold Strike, where a Tuesday morning fire caused at least $20 million in damage.

Authorities say the Gold Strike's alarm system functioned properly during a fire that leveled the resort's casino early Tuesday, even though hotel guests continue to raise questions about how they were notified of the blaze.

Also on Wednesday Clark County Fire Department officials said that in addition to determining a cause of the blaze, their investigation is focusing on why the Gold Strike sprinkler system gave out during the fire. There was a drain in both water pressure and supply for firefighters because the system ended up spraying thousands of gallons of valuable water reserves onto the fire at once.

"Something didn't unfold the way it was supposed to because you should never, ever lose a fully sprinkled building," said county Deputy Fire Marshal John Hall.

The fire at the resort, on U.S. Highway 93 near Boulder City, started on the exterior of the casino near the registration area facing the highway. A specific starting point of the blaze, which took nearly four hours to extinguish, is not known.

The four-alarm fire leveled the casino, causing at least $20 million in damage. Firefighters were able to keep flames from spreading to hotel rooms in an adjacent 17-story tower and to other rooms on the property.

County fire spokesman Steve La-Sky said the fire started either in a casino attic-roofing area or at the base of the casino wall, then spread into the roofing, above fire detection systems. Alarms sounded only after the system was manually pulled, in the casino, by an employee.

La-Sky said a computer printout obtained from the Gold Strike's fire control center Wednesday indicates alarms were pulled at 1:14 a.m. Two minutes later, there was a report of water flow in the casino, and another two minutes passed before fire doors closed where the casino connects with the hotel's tower.

But hotel guests who claim they never heard alarms prior to, during, or after a subsequent evacuation of the tower are correct, authorities said. Hall said the hotel's alarm system is designed so that a fire in the casino doesn't trip alarms in the tower.

"It appears to me the alarms worked exactly as they should have," Hall said. "The fire alarms in the tower would not have activated, and the reason for that is you don't want to dump hundreds or thousands of people from a hotel tower down into your fire zone all at once."

If alarms of a high rise were to sound at the same time on all floors of the structure, you could have people exiting the building into the way of firefighters battling the blaze. Sounding all the hotel alarms at once also could cause a panic or human stampede, Hall said.

"If all of the guests were to exit at once, you could have a whole lot of people injured," he said.

Guests contacted Wednesday continued to say they were upset that no alarms sounded inside the tower, instead being notified by hotel employees pounding on room doors. Every witness contacted by the Review-Journal reported at least moderate smoke in the tower's hallways.

"I think it was absolutely appalling that no alarms went off," said hotel guest Peter Dunn of Denver. Dunn was staying on the 10th floor when the fire broke out. "We had a waitress beating on our door at 2:30 a.m. We didn't know what was going on."

Hall said either the Fire Department or hotel employees could have chosen to manually deploy the alarms in the tower from inside a control center. They also had the option of speaking over an intercom that would have piped verbal messages into each hotel room. Neither procedure was carried out.

"I'm not sure why that didn't happen," La-Sky said.

The alarm system is set up in a way that if a fire alarm does sound on a certain tower floor, it sounds only on the floors above and below the floor where the alarm was activated, Hall said. That design characteristic is also in place to prevent panic.

"I can fully understand the guests' complaints that they weren't informed, but people need to understand this is the way the system is set up," Hall said. "That is a standard you will find not only in Clark County, but nationwide."

The sprinkler system collapse appears to be a more pressing concern for investigators. A six-inch line that feeds the sprinkler system, and which is located inside the casino, somehow ruptured.

Authorities said there is a possibility some kind of explosion broke the water line. Several witnesses inside the casino reported hearing some type of explosion.

Another scenario for the water line rupture involves the fire burning through support beams, causing the roof to collapse onto the water line.

"I simply cannot imagine the sprinkler system not controlling this fire unless something disabled it," Hall said.

The design of the sprinkler heads used in the Gold Strike is also at issue, La-Sky said. Most of sprinkler heads are designed to spray water downward, not up into the air toward the hotel's roof and attic. La-Sky said a chief investigator with the county is considering approaching national fire prevention officials to discuss potential design flaws in the sprinkler heads.

There are no significant problems listed in the Gold Strike's county fire safety inspection records dating back to 1993. In the fire inspection files, county officials praised the Gold Strike's efforts to limit fire liability.

"Your property has an aggressive and thriving fire prevention program," county fire Inspector Steven White wrote in one correspondence to the Gold Strike.

On April 7, 1997, a small fire attributed to smoking materials burning in a trash can was reported at the resort. Smoke was seen on four different floors of the hotel tower, but the smoke detectors on the floor where the fire occurred did not activate. The failure of the alarms to activate resulted in air ducts not shutting down and smoke disseminating through some tower floors.

Afterward, a full inspection of the tower's alarm system was ordered by county officials and the hotel passed the inspection.

Gold Strike officials did not return repeated requests for interviews on Wednesday. In a full-page advertisement placed in the Review-Journal's Wednesday edition, the hotel thanked its employees for their quick thinking in promptly carrying out the evacuation. In a Tuesday afternoon interview, Gold Strike co-owner David Belding said the hotel is proud of the way it dealt with the fire.

Gold Strike officials are currently trying to relocate about 400 employees into positions at Circus Circus Enterprises. The owners of the Gold Strike are key executives at Circus Circus.

Über Gold Strike Hotel and Gambling Hall:

Gold Strike Jean is an 'Old West' themed hotel-casino located on the east side of Interstate-15 on the highway from Los Angeles to Las Vegas.


The property has a 37,000-square-foot casino and 800 rooms. The property also has, among other amenities, a swimming pool and spa, several restaurants, a banquet center, a gift shop and an arcade. The casino has a stage bar with regularly scheduled live entertainment and a casino bar.

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