Industry, fire marshals vow to seek federal upholstery standard
Renewed efforts follow furniture store fire that killed 9 firefighters
Gary Evans -- Furniture Today, June 29, 2007
WEST ASHLEY, S.C. — In the wake of a furniture store fire here June 18 that killed nine firemen, two key groups involved in creating a fire-safety standard for upholstery said they plan to press on to enact a mandatory federal law.
In a statement last week, John Dean, president of the National Assn. of State Fire Marshals, said he is talking with Andy Counts, CEO of the American Home Furnishings Alliance, and is “encouraged by the recent signs the (furniture) industry wants to do the right thing to prevent a very preventable loss of lives involving their products.”
Counts said an effort is under way to get all stakeholders together soon “to revisit the issues, to see what common ground exists, to see what issues are out there — all with the goal of trying to get a workable national standard on the books.”
“There are technical issues that still need to be worked out,” Dean said, “but (there is) much that we already agreed on.”
Their comments come in the wake of a major fire at the Sofa Superstore warehouse and showroom in this Charleston suburb. The roof collapsed, killing the firefighters.
NASFM was the first organization to ask the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission to set fire-safety rules for upholstered furniture, and has been pressing for a national small-open-flame standard for some 20 years.
A few states, including California, have enacted such standards, but the only national standard is the voluntary standard created by the Upholstered Furniture Action Council, an industry group formed in 1974. That standard, ultimately accepted by the CPSC, is designed to prevent fires ignited by smoldering cigarettes, not by such sources as matches, candles and cigarette lighters.
Several groups, including the AHFA, believe a federal mandatory standard would be better that a hodge-podge of state regulations.
Currently, the CPSC is without its required third member and couldn’t take action even if a proposal were to come before it. A Bush administration nominee has aroused opposition and hasn’t been confirmed.
“We want to get something that we can all go to the table with and support,” the AHFA’s Counts said. “Hopefully, we will get it passed once (the CPSC position is filled).”
An agreement on a national standard seemed close a couple years ago, but fell apart at the last minute.
Counts said the AHFA has been focusing on fires caused by cigarettes, which account for 90% of residential upholstery fires. He said the fire marshal’s group has placed more emphasis on open-flame ignitions.
The threats of death, injury and property damage from upholstery fires appears to be easing, but experts attribute that mainly to fewer smokers, greater use of smoke and fire detectors, and fire-safe cigarette legislation in some states. (Those cigarettes stop burning in a short time when not smoked. The tobacco industry has fought such regulation.)
“Since we’ve been having these discussions since the ’70s, there’s been an 85% reduction in deaths, and the trend continues to go downward,” Counts said.
The NASFM’s Dean said firefighters call the foam in a sofa “a bag of solid gasoline sitting in your living room. The Charleston Sofa Superstore was storing this hazardous material in bulk, but people are lost to upholstered furniture fires in their homes at a rate of 10 a week. The fact that mattresses must now be made safer from a fire means that upholstered furniture is the largest single fuel load in the home that does not have to meet a flammability standard for cigarette and open-flame ignitions.”
Meanwhile, Sofa Superstore owner Herb Goldstein reportedly has talked to Charleston Mayor Joe Riley about turning the 2.5-acre store site into a park with a memorial honoring the fallen firefighters. That would depend on the city buying the land.
The Goldstein family is reported to have launched the Charleston Nine Scholarship Endowment for first responders and their families, with a donation of over $100,000. The fund would help the children or dependents of first-responders currently serving, or those who lose their lives in the line of duty, defray college costs.
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Charleston fire spurs calls for FR regs
Jul 1, 2007 -
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