2003 — Feb 20, Fire and Trampling, The Station Nightclub, West Warwick, RI — 100

 

— 100  Durso, Fred Jr. “Managing the Masses. NFPA Journal, July/August 2010, p. 71.

— 100  History.com. This Day in History, Disaster. “Feb 20, 2003, RI Nightclub Burns”

— 100  National Fire Protection Association. Key Dates in Fire History. 1996.

— 100  National Fire Protection Association. The Station Nightclub Fire (webpage).

— 100  NFPA. U.S. Unintentional Fire Death Rates by State. December 2008, p. 25.

— 100  NIST. Report of the Technical Investigation of The Station Nightclub Fire.  2005, iii.

— 100  Sutherland, Scott. “Panic debunked, again.” NFPA Journal, July/August 2009, p. 15.

 

Narrative Information

 

History.com: “A fire at a rock concert in a West Warwick, Rhode Island, nightclub kills 100 people and seriously injures almost 200 more on this day in 2003. It was the deadliest such fire in the United States since 165 people were killed at the Beverly Hill Supper Club in Southgate, Kentucky, in 1977.

 

“On the night of February 20, a local news crew was on hand at the Station nightclub to report on the issue of nightclub safety. (Four days earlier, 21 people had been killed during a stampede at a club in Chicago.) Helping out with the report was Jeffrey Derderian, who co-owned the Station with his brother Michael. That night, they were expecting a full house to see the heavy-metal band Great White.

 

“Just after 11 p.m., near the beginning of the show, Daniel Biechele, Great White’s tour manager, set off some pyrotechnics behind the performers, which set fire to the soundproofing foam on the ceiling. For a short time, no one realized the severity of the situation. As the fire spread rapidly, though, panic ensued. Most of the 400 people at the concert attempted to leave the club through the front entrance.

 

“As black smoke filled the club’s interior, the desperate rush of people to the front entrance caused a pile-up, trapping people where they stood. Though firefighters, who responded within minutes, worked hard to pull people to safety through the front door, 96 people died in the smoke and flames. Most of the bodies were found near the front entrance. Among the dead was Great White’s guitarist, Ty Longley. Another 35 people were left in critical condition, including four who would later die from their injuries.

 

“In the aftermath of the tragedy, Daniel Biechele was indicted for setting off the pyrotechnics without a permit. He pled guilty to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter and received a sentence of four years in prison with 11 more years suspended. Michael Derderian pled guilty for his role in maintaining the Station and received a 15-year sentence (four years to serve, and 11 years suspended). His brother Jeffrey got a 10-year suspended sentence.” (History.com. This Day in History…February 20, 2003, “Rhode Island Nightclub Burns”)

 

NFPA, The Station Nightclub Fire (webpage): “The fourth deadliest nightclub fire in U.S. history,[1] a blaze at The Station nightclub in W. Warwick, RI, on February 20, 2003, claimed 100 lives. After the fire, NFPA enacted tough new code provisions for fire sprinklers and crowd management in nightclub-type venues. Those provisions mark sweeping changes to the codes and standards governing safety in assembly occupancies.” (National Fire Protection Association. The Station Nightclub Fire webpage.) [This NFPA webpage contains links to a number of other documents relating to the fire, its aftermath, and effects.]

 

NIST: “A fire occurred on the night of Feb. 20, 2003, in The Station nightclub at 211 Cowesett Avenue, West Warwick, Rhode Island. A band that was on the platform that night, during its performance, used pyrotechnics that ignited polyurethane foam insulation lining the walls and ceiling of the platform. The fire spread quickly along the walls and ceiling area over the dance floor. Smoke was visible in the exit doorways in a little more than one minute, and flames were observed breaking through a portion of the roof in less than five minutes. Egress from the nightclub, which was not equipped with sprinklers, was hampered by crowding at the main entrance to the building.  One hundred people lost their lives in the fire.  On Feb. 27, 2003, under the authority of the National Construction Safety Team (NCST) Act, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NISI) established a National Construction Safety Team to determine the likely technical cause or causes of the building failure that led to the high number of casualties in that fire. This report documents the procedures, findings, and issues that were raised by the investigation….

 

“The investigation concluded that strict adherence to 2003 model codes available at the time of the fire would go a long way to preventing similar tragedies in the future. Changes to the codes subsequent to the fire made them stronger. By making some additional changes — and state and local agencies adopting and enforcing them — we can strengthen occupant safety even further.

 

“Ten recommendations to improve model building and fire codes, standards and practices (as they existed in February 2003) resulted from the investigation, including (i) urging state and local jurisdictions to (a) adopt and update building and fire codes covering nightclubs based on one of the model codes and (b) enforce those codes aggressively; (ii) strengthening the requirements for the installation of automatic fire sprinklers; (iii) increasing the factor of safety on the time for occupants to egress; (iv) tightening the restriction on the use of flexible polyurethane foam — and other materials that ignite as easily and propagate flames as rapidly as non-fire retarded foam — as an interior finish product; (v) further limiting the use of pyrotechnics; and (vi) conducting research in specific areas to underpin the recommended changes.” (NIST. Report…Technical Investigation…The Station Nightclub Fire. June 2005, iii.)

 

Durso: “….Crowd managers weren’t present at The Station. Nor had they been present at the E2 Nightclub in Chicago just days earlier, when a crowd crush killed 21 people. In the wake of those incidents, NFPA issued interim amendments to NFPA 101®, Life Safety Code®, and NFPA 5000®, Building Construction and Safety Code®, that took effect in 2003. The amendments addressed assembly occupancy main entrance egress width, sprinklers in certain assembly occupancies, and limitations on festival seating. The amendments also required the presence of a trained crowd manager for every 250 people in all assembly occupancies; previous editions of the codes required crowd managers only where the occupant load exceeded 1,000 persons….” (Durso, Fred Jr. “Managing the Masses. National Fire Protection Association, NFPA Journal, July/August 2010, p. 71 of 71-73.)

 

Sources

 

Durso, Fred Jr. “Managing the Masses. National Fire Protection Association, NFPA Journal, July/August 2010, pp. 71-73.

 

 

History.com. This Day in History, Disaster, February 20, 2003. “Rhode Island Nightclub Burns.” Accessed 12-07-2008 at:  http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&displayDate=02/20&categoryId=disaster

 

National Fire Protection Association. Key Dates in Fire History. 1996, 2010. Accessed 5-25-2016 at:  http://www.nfpa.org/research/reports-and-statistics/key-dates-in-fire-history

 

National Fire Protection Association. The Station Nightclub Fire (webpage). Accessed 6-1-2015 at: http://www.nfpa.org/safety-information/for-consumers/occupancies/nightclubs-assembly-occupancies/the-station-nightclub-fire

 

National Fire Protection Association (John Hall, Jr.). U.S. Unintentional Fire Death Rates by State. Quincy, MA: NFPA, 31 pages, December 2008.

 

National Institute of Standards and Technology. Report of the Technical Investigation of The Station Nightclub Fire (NIST NCSTAR 2: Vol. I). Washington, DC:  Department of Commerce, NIST, June 2005. Accessed 6-1-2015 at: http://fire.nist.gov/bfrlpubs/fire05/PDF/f05032.pdf

 

Sutherland, Scott. “Panic debunked, again.” NFPA Journal, July/August 2009, p. 15.

 

 

 

 

 

[1] See our files on: (1) Nov 28, 1942 Cocoanut Grove Night Club Fire in Boston with 492 lives lost; (2) April 23, 1940 Rhythm Club Dane Hall Fire in Natchez, MS with 207 deaths; (3) May 28, 1977 Beverly Hills Supper Club Fire in Southgate, KY, with 165 lives lost.