We must learn to think the unthinkable. When I first postulated the total collapse of a post-tensioned concrete building under construction at a 1972 National Fire Protection Association meeting, the editor of a fire journal refused to print it, saying, “I just can’t believe they are building buildings that will completely collapse.”
We must go beyond EXPERIENCE to competent risk analysis. We must learn that “fire resistance” is at best just a hope, not a mathematical given, as is often assumed. We must learn that the failure of a single vulnerable connection can precipitate disaster.
I have been in love with FDNY for 75 years. My first line-of-duty funeral was for the eight firefighters who died in the unsprinklered paint room of a spare-no-expense hotel in 1932.
May they all rest in peace. May their families and friends take comfort in the Biblical verse: “Greater love no man hath than he lay down his life for a friend.” How much more loving to lay down one’s life for a stranger!
