2000 Fires

Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: Kaprun Disaster, Enschede Fireworks Disaster, Boland Hall Fire, Ibadan Tanker Truck Explosion, 2000 Luoyang Christmas Fire, Old Mill, Childers Palace Backpackers Hostel Fire. Excerpt: The Kaprun disaster was a fire that occurred in an ascending railway car in the tunnel of the Gletscherbahn 2 railway in Kaprun, Austria, on 11 November 2000. The disaster claimed the lives of 155 people, leaving 12 survivors (10 Germans, 2 Austrians) from the burning car. The victims were skiers on their way to the Kitzsteinhorn Glacier. The train, the Gletscherbahn 2, was a funicular railway running from Kaprun to the Kitzsteinhorn, opened in 1974. This railway had the unusual track gauge of 946 millimeters, and a length of 3900 meters, of which 3300 meters was through a tunnel. There were two carriages on a single track, with a section allowing the trains to pass each other halfway. One train would carry passengers up the mountain while the other train simultaneously descended the mountain. The carriages each had a maximum capacity of 180 passengers. The tunnel terminated at the main reception centre, called the Alpine Centre. The unit had its fire extinguishers out of the passengers' reach in the sealed attendant compartments. No smoke detectors existed on board. The passengers had no method of contacting the attendant. Professor Joseph Nejez, a funicular train expert, said that the designers throughout the years had a perception that a fire could not occur since no fire occurred in a funicular cabin prior to the Kaprun disaster. The train complied with area safety codes, which did not address the systems installed on the train during its 1993 upgrade. The onboard electric power, hydraulic systems, and fan heaters intended for use in homes instead of trains... More: