By Barbara Ortutay
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
A small fire from a halogen lamp led tenants to evacuate several
apartments in a Westwood building the morning of July 18.
The fire was contained by the building’s sprinkler system,
but it raised concerns among residents regarding fire safety in the
507 Glenrock Ave. apartment complex.
“The fire alarm goes off all the time. We didn’t
think anything about it,” said Miranda Davis, a fourth-year
psychobiology student, who lives next door to the apartment where
the fire started.
The manager of the building declined to be quoted for this
story.
Davis said she left her room when someone started pounding on
her door and alerted her about the fire, but she wouldn’t
have left had she only heard the alarm. She said she is not sure
whether the alarm is dysfunctional or if people pull it.
“It goes off one or two times a month at least,” she
said. “When we were outside I looked up and there were people
looking out from their balconies.”
Pulling a fire alarm when there is no fire is illegal,
punishable by up to a $2,750 fine and/or six months in jail,
according to Patrick Kallian, Los Angeles Fire Department
firefighter.
Michelle Hernandez, who lives on the same floor, was also in her
apartment when the fire started. Although the alarms went off, the
third-year biology student said she wouldn’t have evacuated
had she not smelled the smoke.
Kallian said it’s dangerous when people don’t leave
their rooms when they hear a fire alarm. On Jan. 19, three students
were killed and more than 50 injured in a dormitory fire at Seton
Hall University in New Jersey.
“Everyone rolled over, nobody took it seriously and
because of that, nobody got out,” Kallian said.
When the fire started, Davis and other residents said it was
difficult to find a fire extinguisher in the four-story building.
After checking, however, they found one on the third floor,
according to Davis.
“The whole problem would have been much smaller if there
had been fire extinguishers on each floor,” she said.
An apartment building is required to have fire extinguishers
inside every case, according to Kallian. If they are empty, the
building’s management must replace them.
At 507 Glenrock, two of the four cases were empty on the day of
the fire. There were no cases on the floor where the fire started,
so by law the building was not required to have an extinguisher
there. On July 23, five days after the fire, the extinguishers were
still missing from three of the four cases in the building.
Davis, who has lived in the building all year, said
extinguishers were always missing.
The fire started from a combustible material being too close to
a halogen lamp, according to Capt. Steve Ruda from the Los Angeles
Fire Department. He said students should be careful using these
lamps. Nothing should be hung from them and they should be kept
away from combustible materials.
“A lot of times students use them because they’re
cheap,” he said. “But they can burn up to 1,200
degrees.”
The sprinklers caused water damage in the apartment where the
fire started and the one below it.
<</table> APARTMENT FIRE SAFETY
Halogen lamps can burn up to 1,200 degrees and are potential fire
hazards.
- Don’t put extension cords under carpets or rugs.
- Don’t place combustible materials near a halogen lamp.
- Keep at least three feet between combustibles and portable
heaters.
SOURCE: Los Angeles Fire Department
Original graphic by ADAM BROWN/Daily Bruin
Web adaptation by CHRISTINE TAN