POST
PRODUCTION
SCRIPT
FOUR
CORNERS
2017
Combustible
41
mins 33 secs
©2017
ABC
Ultimo Centre
700
Harris Street Ultimo
NSW
2007 Australia
GPO
Box 9994
Sydney
NSW
2001 Australia
Phone: 61 2 8333 4383
Fax: 61 2 8333 4859
e-mail thompson.haydn@abc.net.au
Precis
|
The dangerous legacy of failed
regulation in the building industry. |
|
|
“You shouldn't have a combustible product on the
outside of a building of this type, so how has this been allowed to
happen?” Fire officer |
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Across Australia, governments, councils and the building industry are
grappling with a problem so large, it almost defies belief. |
|
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“It’s unquantifiable…” Senior Fire
Officer |
|
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Residential buildings, hospitals, shopping centres and commercial
buildings, have been built with flammable aluminium cladding, posing a
potentially serious fire risk. |
|
|
“As soon as I saw that on television that night,
straight away I knew it was a cladding fire.” Cladding
supplier |
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|
It took the catastrophic Grenfell Tower fire in London, which claimed
at least 80 lives, to set off alarm bells here, but as Four Corners will reveal, the danger posed by this cladding
should not have come as a surprise. |
|
|
“You can’t tell me that if this product, by all
reports, has been used widely in the industry for 10 to 30 years, that major
suppliers … didn’t know where this product was going to end up.” Fire officer |
|
|
Four Corners investigates why huge amounts
of this aluminium cladding have been installed on so many buildings, and
whether a desire to cut costs won out over caution. |
|
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“We have, if you will, a builder, a certifier and
a fire engineer who are incentivized to reduce cost.” Fire Engineer |
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Insiders say there has been a colossal failure of regulation and
oversight. |
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“There’s people out there that would have
absolutely no idea what they’re doing and they’re installing it incorrectly,
and they’re the people we compete against every day.”
Builder |
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|
With access to the tests now under way on suspect aluminium cladding,
we reveal the enormity of the problem facing authorities and ask who will pay
to remove and replace it. |
|
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“Everyone has someone else to point the finger
at. The product of deregulation and self-accreditation, this process of
abrogation of responsibility is that no one is responsible.” Federal
politician |
|
Grenfell
Tower fire archive |
Music |
00:12 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT, REPORTER: It's the stuff of
nightmares. |
00:31 |
|
In June, as the world watched in horror, London's
Grenfell Tower was devoured by flames. |
00:37 |
|
At the height of the blaze, parts of the building
rained down near firefighters and bystanders. |
00:49 |
|
To many in the building industry - even here in
Australia - it was clear straightaway what was falling. It was aluminium
cladding that had been made with a highly flammable polyethylene or PE core. |
01:07 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Did you know what was on the
building when you saw those pictures? |
01:26 |
Geddes
100%. Super: |
STEPHEN GEDDES, SUPPLIER: Absolutely, absolutely,
it's PE. DEBBIE WHITMONT: Why did you think that? STEPHEN GEDDES: Because of the way that the
flames spread and the way that the panels were falling off the wall. Just
because, with PE, it goes up the building and down the building. The droplets
spread the flame, and I knew exactly what it was. Absolutely, and anybody in
the industry would know exactly what it was. |
01:30 |
Grenfell
Tower fire archive |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire began from an
electrical fault in a fridge in a fourth-floor apartment. The flames leapt
out a window, caught the cladding outside, then raced around the building and
up twenty floors - to the twenty fourth - within fifteen minutes. DEBBIE WHITMONT: So, how combustible is this
stuff? |
01:56 |
|
TONY ENRIGHT, FIRE ENGINEER: A kilogram of
polyethylene will release the same amount of energy as a kilogram of petrol, |
02:18 |
Enright
100%. Super: |
and it gets worse than that because polyethylene
is denser than petrol too, so that's about -- a kilogram of polyethylene is
like about one and a bit, one and a half litres of petrol. DEBBIE WHITMONT: And so how many kilograms of
polyethylene might there be on the side of a building? |
02:23 |
Grenfell
Tower fire archive |
TONY ENRIGHT: If you look at a one metre by one
metre square section, that will have about three kilograms, |
02:39 |
Enright
100% |
the equivalent of about five litres of petrol. |
02:45 |
Grenfell
Tower fire archive |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Grenfell Tower was a catastrophe
-- polyethylene cladding, flammable insulation, poor maintenance, a lack of
sprinklers and bad advice not to evacuate. |
02:47 |
|
The inferno left more than eighty people dead. The
final toll still isn't known. The Grenfell fire shocked UK authorities, but for
some it was a reminder of what almost happened here. |
03:04 |
Erikson
100%. Super: |
TIM ERIKSON, SENIOR STATION OFFICER, METROPOLITAN
FIRE BRIGADE: Yeah, the flashbacks happened. You sort of thought about what
could have been at Lacrosse, but it's an absolute tragedy, just a waste of
life really. |
03:23 |
Melbourne
high rise GVs. Night. |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Two and a half years before the
Grenfell fire, 450 people in a Melbourne high rise had a narrow escape. |
03:34 |
|
The Lacrosse fire began just after two a.m. on a
Tuesday morning in a redeveloped
industrial area called Docklands. |
03:45 |
|
Swim coach Peter Howes was asleep on the 16th
floor. |
03:54 |
Lacrosse
building exteriors |
PETER HOWES, LACROSSE RESIDENT: I woke up
thinking my alarm was going off, that I had to work and I got up quickly,
turned the lights on. |
03:58 |
Howes
100%. Super: |
I looked up into the ceiling and I could see
about 30 centimetres of smoke, so it was my smoke alarm that was going off. |
04:06 |
Lacrosse
building exteriors |
The fire started on an eighth floor balcony. |
04:13 |
|
000 EMERGENCY CALL - Emergency services, what is the address that
you need the fire brigade to go to? |
04:19 |
Sequence
of Fire fighters getting ready to go to fire |
- The flat is um 805. - Yep. - And the address is 673 La Trobe Street. - In what suburb or town? - It's Docklands. - 802/673 La Trobe Street, Docklands. - And It's just a fire in the balcony, I don't
know how it started. |
04:24 |
Truck
leaving station, driving to Lacrosse building |
- Is it your apartment? - It's really big though. - Is it your apartment? - It's really, really big. - The fire brigade will be there soon, bye. |
04:39 |
|
Music |
04:49 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The first crews arrived within five
minutes. They were expecting a fire in one apartment. They couldn't believe
what they saw. |
05:00 |
Archive.
Lacrosse building fire |
TIM ERIKSON: This was outside the building, it
was burning on five or 10 floors. |
05:08 |
Erikson
100% |
This was completely outside of anything that we
were prepared for or expecting. |
05:17 |
|
There was actually a moment of absolute silence
in the truck. |
05:22 |
Firefighter
putting on helmet |
Music |
05:26 |
Erikson
at Lacrosse fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Tim Erikson was one of the first
responders. |
05:30 |
Lacrosse
building fire |
MFB RADIO COMMUNICATIONS: We have a fire in a
multi storey apartment, multi-story building, the fire is on the third floor
extending up to the 10th floor, going along the balconies. We have huge
amount of smoke and fire on the buildings, we have multiple people inside the
building. |
05:34 |
Fire
fighters at scene |
TIM ERIKSON: Well, the first thing that we needed
to do was to |
05:52 |
Erikson
100% |
look out for the people that were there and get
them out of that building. |
05:54 |
Fire
fighters at scene |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Fire fighters had to check more
than 200 apartments. |
05:57 |
Lauren and Brooking 100% |
Brooking: They banged on the door, actually. Lauren: Yeah… twice. Brooking: That's what kind of woke us up to,
"Wow, we better check this out". |
06:04 |
Lacrosse
building exteriors |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Brooking and Lauren Stapleton
were on the third floor. |
06:10 |
Lauren and Brooking 100% |
LAUREN STAPLETON: You could smell the smoke. You
knew there was a fire. It was evident there was a fire, as well, and the
firemen were, 'Come on guys, you've got to get down there quickly.' |
06:16 |
Lacrosse
building fire |
TIM ERIKSON: It was burning really quickly and
really fiercely. |
06:25 |
Erikson
100%. Super: |
I spent a couple of minutes outside at the front
just marshalling the crews and getting them organised, |
06:31 |
Lacrosse
building fire |
but those couple of minutes I spent out the front
you could see it spreading upwards. |
06:37 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Within minutes, the flames had
reached the 21st floor, the top of the building. Around 450 people were
evacuated. |
06:44 |
Brooking
and Lauren Stapleton 100% |
BROOKING STAPLETON: When we turned around and saw
the fire up the side of the building, it was a bit shocking wasn't it? We
couldn't believe it. We didn't realise it had gone so high at this point. It
was scary actually. |
06:57 |
Lacrosse
building fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The Lacrosse fire astonished the
fire brigade's most senior fire fighters. |
07:14 |
Dalrymple
100%. Super: |
ADAM DALRYMPLE, ASSISTANT CHIEF FIRE OFFICER,
METROPOLITAN FIRE BRIGADE: In our whole history of over 100 years, 125 years,
and the way buildings are constructed, this - we've never seen anything like
it before. So you have multiple seats of fire over multiple levels all at the
same time and what that does is actually challenges the way you fight a fire. |
07:22 |
Lacrosse
building fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire didn't only spread
upward. MARK CARTER, COMMANDER, METROPOLITAN FIRE
BRIGADE: We did have a case here |
07:39 |
Carter
on street. Super: |
where even though the fire started on the eighth
floor, burning chunks fell down below to the sixth floor and the fire ignited
on the sixth and connected up with the eighth. |
07:49 |
Lacrosse
building fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Incredibly - thanks to good luck
and a good sprinkler system - there were only a few minor injuries. The fire
brigade says there could easily have been fatalities. |
07:58 |
Dalrymple
100% |
ADAM DALRYMPLE: A scenario such as Lacrosse, if
it wasn't brought under control in a pretty quick amount of time, it could
claim hundreds of lives. There's no doubt about that. We did say it was a
fire that's unexpected, unprecedented, we responded really, really well, and
the building occupants themselves responded really, really well. So there was
a lot of things that happened at that particular fire that worked well for
everybody. |
08:14 |
Carter
on street |
MARK CARTER: We were really lucky with the
weather conditions on the night. If we'd had flaming lumps of molten
aluminium be pushed by the wind to adjoining apartment balconies, it would
have gone up another section and that's what we've seen from looking at other
fires around the world, that's pretty similar behaviour. |
09:39 |
Carter
and Whitmont on balcony of Lacrosse building looking at cladding |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: So this is the panelling that
we're talking about here is it? This cladding on the veranda? MARK CARTER: Yeah, at the end of the balcony
here. DEBBIE WHITMONT: The Metropolitan Fire Brigade
launched a major investigation. It was co-ordinated by Commander Mark Carter.
He showed us how the fire started - on an eighth-floor balcony. A French
traveller on a working holiday came home late, had a cigarette ... and
thought he put it out in a plastic container. |
09:01 |
|
MARK CARTER: We had outdoor furniture, we had
lots of combustible items. |
09:28 |
Reconstruction
video. Super: |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire brigade made a graphic
reconstruction. MARK CARTER: So, we had in this case a table and
chairs and lots of things around it. As we know from the fire investigation
there was a plastic yoghurt container which was being used for cigarette
butts. That started a fire, onto the timber furniture. |
09:33 |
Video
continues |
The fire got in behind the air conditioning unit
and then the panel ignited and with the ignition of the panel, we had flames
shooting up the side. So, the fire actually spread from one level to another
and continued on up the building. DEBBIE WHITMONT: This shows how the fire spread |
09:52 |
Video
continues showing spread of fire |
up the building from balcony to balcony. ADAM DALRYMPLE: What's really striking about it
was actually the fire progression. It progressed up to level 21 in less than
eight minutes. Nobody in the country's really seen anything like that before, |
10:11 |
Dalrymple
100%. Super: |
and the vertical fire spread for the particular
fire was unprecedented. In my career, I've never seen anything like it. |
10:27 |
Cladding
GFX |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Cladding -- made from two sheets
of aluminium sandwiched around a core -- ran right up the building. |
10:34 |
Carter
on street. Super: |
MARK CARTER: Our first reaction was how the hell
has this happened? How have we got a modern building that we know what the
construction code says, that you shouldn't have a combustible product on the
outside of a building of this type. So how has this been allowed to happen? |
10:44 |
Fire
fighter on balcony after fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire brigade sent a sample
of the cladding to the CSIRO (the
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) for
testing. |
11:01 |
Carter
on street |
MARK CARTER: We were pretty confident of the
results we would get, but we were nonetheless surprised when CSIRO reported
back to us and said they had to cease the test because they thought they were
going to damage their equipment. |
11:09 |
Stills.
Aftermath of fire. Balcony/Air conditioning unit |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire brigade was even more
surprised to be told that the core of the cladding was made of 100%
polyethylene - a highly combustible plastic. |
11:22 |
|
ADAM DALRYMPLE: The report came back and said
that the cladding type used |
11:34 |
Dalrymple
100% |
was a combustible piece of cladding, and in
effect, doesn't comply with the regulations for a building of that size. DEBBIE WHITMONT: So how did it get to be there? ADAM DALRYMPLE: Well, that's the million-dollar
question. |
11:37 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: So how many other buildings do
you think would have similar types of cladding? ADAM DALRYMPLE: Well I can't answer that. I
reckon it's, well it's unquantifiable. DEBBIE WHITMONT: Unquantifiable? ADAM DALRYMPLE: Yeah. DEBBIE WHITMONT: Does that mean thousands? ADAM DALRYMPLE: Well it might mean more than
thousands. |
11:49 |
Time
lapse – Brisbane River, Southbank |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Aluminium cladding has been
spreading all over Australia for more than three decades. |
12:03 |
Hodder
walks with Whitmont in City |
Daron Hodder spent twenty years selling and
installing it in Brisbane. |
12:14 |
|
He says from the first time he showed it to
architects, they loved it. |
12:21 |
Hodder
100%. Super: |
DARON HODDER, FORMER SUPPLIER: They liked it
because typically we'd had solid aluminium in the market which was harder to
fabricate, it's not as straight or as flat, the paint finish also is not as
high quality as well. That's what the composite panel delivers, it's an
unmatched quality product in that regard. |
12:28 |
Whitmont
and Hodder in city looking at buildings |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Most of the cladding Daron
Hodder sold was made in Japan by Mitsubishi. |
12:44 |
High-rise
building GVs |
In the beginning, no one questioned the fact it was
made with polyethylene. |
12:54 |
Hodder
100% |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: What did you know about that at
the time? DARON HODDER: All I knew about it was that it was
good for manufacturing, it was lightweight, and yes, no other issues back
then. |
13:04 |
Hodder
and Whitmont walk in city, look up at buildings |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: All through the 1990s, Daron
Hodder sold tens of thousands of square metres of polyethylene cladding every
year for buildings like this one in down town Brisbane. But then around the
year 2000 Mitsubishi sounded a warning -- that polyethylene was flammable. |
13:15 |
Hodder
100% |
DARON HODDER: We had Hiroshi Tanaka the big boss
of Mitsubishi, very respected man globally, and he came out to Australia. He
had known there were some issues with polyethylene, we had no idea at the
time, and he just said, "No more, no more polyethylene". |
13:39 |
Geddes
in cladding warehouse with friend |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Stephen Geddes had been selling
Mitsubishi's polyethylene cladding in Sydney. He remembers a Mitsubishi engineer
telling him that polyethylene - a by-product of the petrochemical industry -
was basically a fuel. STEPHEN GEDDES: I remember some time ago, back in
the 2000s, |
13:54 |
Geddes
100%. Super: |
they had an older engineer that worked there who
said that a building that had something like 3,000 square metres of panel on,
contained about three and a half thousand litres of petrol. So, it's quite
scary when you think about it. |
14:17 |
Whitmont
and Geddes at warehouse |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: By then, Mitsubishi had
developed a new fire resistant - or FR - cladding. It still contained
polyethylene - but much less. FR was less combustible - but more expensive. Geddes
and Hodder both started selling it. |
14:36 |
Geddes
100% |
STEPHEN GEDDES: At the time, we were as much as
$10, $11 a square metre, you know, more expensive. So, it was a massive risk
on the company's behalf to do that and we did lose sales, absolutely we did
lose sales because of it. |
14:57 |
Building
exteriors |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: But there were already hundreds
of thousands of square metres of PE cladding on Australian buildings. And
most of it is still there. |
15:16 |
Geddes
100% |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: So up until 2000 when your
company switched over to FR cladding how much PE cladding would there have been
going up in Australia? STEPHEN GEDDES: Tens of thousands, tens of
thousands of square metres, there would be, if not hundreds of thousands of
square metres. DEBBIE WHITMONT: And most of that is still there? STEPHEN GEDDES: Yes. |
15:30 |
High
rise building exteriors |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Other companies continued
selling PE. |
15:55 |
GFX
Alucobond book |
Mitsubishi's biggest cladding competitor was
called Alucobond- it was made in Germany with polyethylene. Alucobond PE
still graces high end developments from Sydney to Perth. |
16:02 |
Whitmont
and Hodder |
In 2007, the new Australian supplier of Alucobond
invited Daron Hodder to the manufacturer's headquarters in Germany. |
16:16 |
Hodder
100% |
Hodder was shocked to be told that although the
Germans had developed a fire-resistant cladding - polyethylene cladding was
still being sold in Australia. |
16:26 |
|
DARON HODDER: We sat down at the boardroom table
and I said to the head German engineer there, I said, 'Well, what are you
using through Europe?' and he said, 'Well the Alucobond Plus, Daron, and the
next product up from that. |
16:38 |
|
So, then I turned to the two people who had taken
me there and I said to them - 'Why aren't you bringing it into Australia?',
and their response was, 'We don't have to and it's cheaper to stay with
polyethylene.' |
16:52 |
Alucobond
panels |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Four Corners asked the supplier
of Alucobond for an interview - but they declined. They did not recall the
comment allegedly made in the meeting in Germany. |
17:06 |
Construction,
crane shots |
Music |
17:17 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: As building boomed even more PE
cladding began flooding in from Asia. |
17:26 |
High
rise building exteriors |
It was modern and shiny, quick, and easy to build
with, and most of all it was cheap. By the late 2000s PE cladding was on the
march. |
17:33 |
Hodder
interview |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: What was the state of knowledge
in the market by then about polyethylene? DARON HODDER: That it was highly flammable. |
17:49 |
Fabrication
sequence |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The problem was cladding had
started out as just a decorative attachment, now it was being used as the
main part of walls. So did it really comply with the building code? Though
everyone was using it, no one really knew. |
17:55 |
GFX:
ACT Fire Brigade minutes. On screen text: |
In 2010, the ACT Fire Brigade tried to come up
with an answer. It called an industry meeting but no one was sure. |
18:21 |
Aluminium
cladding products (ACP) |
The Australian Building Codes Board couldn't say
either. |
18:31 |
Geddes
100%. Super: |
STEPHEN GEDDES: There was a lot of talk about
what needed to be done, what could be done, but how many people had to be
involved, and the time that it would take for it to go through. So, it really
just got brushed under the carpet. |
18:36 |
Senate
Committee hearing |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Since Lacrosse, a senate
committee has been looking into building products. In July, after the
Grenfell fire, the senators asked the company that sells Alucobond whether PE
cladding should be banned in Australia. |
18:56 |
Carr
in hearing. Super: |
KIM CARR, ALP SENATOR: The question is why should
we allow it into the country? I'm old fashioned. I think 'non-combustible'
means it shouldn't catch fire, and it shouldn’t be a fire hazard. WADE MARTIN, ALUCOBOND SUPPLIER: Yes. |
19:13 |
Xenophon
at hearing |
NICK XENOPHON, NXT SENATOR: What standard is
non-combustible then? |
19:24 |
Wade
Martin at hearing. Super: |
WADE MARTIN: The code is – well, the standard is
AS 1530, part 1. And there is no such thing as a panel that passes AS 1530
part 1 as the product would be supplied. |
19:27 |
Xenophon
questions Martin and Rayment. Super: |
NICK XENOPHON: What do you mean no such thing? We
have a standard but no one can comply with the standard? Can you explain that
to me? So, there's a standard for non-combustible material, AS 1530 part 1,
but no-one actually complies with that at the moment? |
19:36 |
|
WADE MARTIN: As the material would be supplied. So,
if you supplied a material, the product would not pass that test. |
19:56 |
|
NICK XENOPHON: Sorry I'm being a bit slow here. What
are you saying? So there's a standard we can't comply with? WADE MARTIN: Correct. BRUCE RAYMENT: Correct. |
20:03 |
|
NICK XENOPHON: Why can't it be complied with? |
20:11 |
|
WADE MARTIN: Because the actual test itself is
not intended for these types of products, for one. |
20:13 |
|
NICK XENOPHON: So we have a standard that can't
be complied with? |
20:19 |
|
WADE MARTIN: Yes |
20:22 |
|
NICK XENOPHON: It's not much of standard then is
it? |
20:23 |
|
WADE MARTIN: No. |
20:24 |
|
NICK XENOPHON: Okay, this is doing my head in. |
20:27 |
Xenophon
interview |
NICK XENOPHON: Look, it's like 'Yes Minister' now,
but this could end up as a coronial inquest because if there is a fire
because of cladding and there are multiple lives lost, then no doubt we'll
have a royal commission, no doubt we'll have coronial inquests and people
will be asking why weren't we warned about this? Well, the fact is, the
warnings have been out there for years, and this inquiry is basically saying
there are no excuses not to act. |
20:30 |
Whitmont
and Webb in CSIRO lab |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Four Corners asked the CSIRO to
show us the building code's test for combustibility. |
20:57 |
|
Alex Webb is a CSIRO fire engineer. |
21:04 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: So, what have we got here Alex? ALEX WEBB, FIRE ENGINEER: So we have three
samples of the core materials from aluminium composite panels. |
21:09 |
Webb
with core materials, conducts test |
One hundred per cent polyethylene core. This is
what's known as an FR, with some mineral filler or fire retardant and this is
a much higher proportion, with only a small proportion of polyethylene. |
21:16 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: And what are you going to do
with them? ALEX WEBB: This is the Australian Standard 1530
part 1 apparatus. So this is quite a small but ferocious test. |
21:28 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The first sample is 100%
polyethylene - the material used in the core of PE cladding. |
21:37 |
|
ALEX WEBB: So, the furnace is held at 750
Celsius. Very stable temperature. Takes quite a while to warm up. So, what
we're looking for |
21:48 |
Super:
|
is any flaming that occurs, and also, we log the
temperatures within the sample on the side. And if that temperature rises
more than 50 degrees, that's also one of the other criteria. |
21:57 |
Combustibility
test continues |
So, we have to run the test for 30 minutes, and
be able to measure the temperature from the end to the highest peak as well. |
22:08 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The combustibility test is
supposed to run for half an hour - but the PE failed in minutes. ALEX WEBB: One sample flames more than five
seconds, that's combustible. So, that ignited very early and flamed
substantially. |
22:19 |
|
And we had to take the sample out as you saw. If
we leave it in too long, all the material melts to the bottom or we damage
the equipment. |
22:42 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire-resistant cladding only
did a little better. ALEX WEBB: So the next one had some filler in it. |
22:52 |
|
Some fire retardant, some mineral filler. DEBBIE WHITMONT: About 70 percent, you said? ALEX WEBB: Approximately, yes. |
23:02 |
|
But that's still got 30 percent polyethylene, so
it performs very similarly in this test. Still flames, still gets a
temperature rise, but does it a bit slower. DEBBIE WHITMONT: So, technically combustible? |
23:07 |
|
ALEX WEBB: Deemed as combustible. |
23:19 |
Test
continues |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Even the most fire-resistant
cladding - with only a very small amount of PE is still combustible. And then the final one. Tell me about that one. ALEX WEBB: That's still a polyethylene, but it
has even more filler. |
23:20 |
|
That as well would be deemed combustible, because
that one still flamed. |
23:37 |
|
So, this test method's really good because it is
quite cheap, reasonably quick, has a high bar to pass. So, we know the
results are good, and we're going to end up with a safe product. |
23:45 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The problem is - it's a test of
components - and it wasn't designed for products like cladding. There are
plans to introduce a much bigger full-scale wall test - like one already used
in the US - next year. But it's much harder to do and much more expensive. |
23:57 |
|
ALEX WEBB: It's quite a bit different test
method, but that can be used if you need to get compliance for a whole wall
system which includes the cladding, the insulation, and the structure. |
24:19 |
Dalrymple
100%. Super: |
ADAM DALRYMPLE: There's products that come into
the market that don't meet the requirements of Australian standards. We know
that and we've seen that as a result of Lacrosse. So we need to look at the
way we accredit products and the way we import products. DEBBIE WHITMONT: Should they be banned from
import? ADAM DALRYMPLE: Well, it’s not about them being
banned, because some of them meet appropriate applications. |
24:29 |
|
You can get a piece of cladding that you can use
on your own home, but you can't use it on a multi-storey building. |
24:50 |
Barnett
100%. Super: |
JONATHAN BARNETT, FIRE ENGINEER: Our building
code also allows the products to be used, if an engineer has done a full
assessment that says it's safe to use it in this particular way, in this
particular building. |
24:57 |
Orange
cladding on building |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Jonathan Barnett is a fire
engineer - yet it was only after the Lacrosse fire that he checked out the
cladding on his own building - where he bought off the plan four years ago. It's
PE - it stretches right up to the roof - and it will have to go. But
Barnett's not panicking. |
25:07 |
Barnett
100% |
JONATHAN BARNETT, FIRE ENGINEER: Well, I wouldn't
live here if I wasn't comfortable. I do this for a living. I mean I worry
about fire engineering. The building is safe to occupy. Do we have to fix the
cladding? Absolutely. |
25:33 |
Orange
cladding on building |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Other fire engineers are less
sanguine. |
25:47 |
Enright
100%. Super: |
TONY ENRIGHT: My personal opinion? No. No. I
don't think that there's a place for polyethylene cladding on buildings at
all. |
25:52 |
Exteriors. Royal Adelaide Hospital |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Tony Enright advised on fire
safety for the new Royal Adelaide Hospital. Enright recommended one of the
highest grades of fire resistant cladding available - and one of the most
expensive. |
26:02 |
Enright
100% |
TONY ENRIGHT: At the time we were saying do you
want to wrap your hospital in plastic? And after a couple of years we changed
that to, 'Do you want to wrap it in petrol?' |
26:22 |
Archival.
France apartment block fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Fires like this, at an apartment
block in northern France, show how polyethylene cladding can enflame and fuel
the fire. This one left one resident dead. |
26:29 |
Archival.
Dubai apartment block fire |
A couple of years later combustible cladding
caught fire at one of the tallest residential buildings in the world - the
86-storey - and unfortunately named Torch Tower in Dubai. |
26:25 |
Whitmont
walks with Dwyer |
But polyethylene isn't the only dangerous product
we're putting on our buildings. Now polystyrene is springing up too. PHIL DWYER, PRESIDENT, BUILDERS COLLECTIVE: The
product we're talking about is the styrene foam used in packaging and so on. If
it burns it'll melt, it'll melt like a marshmallow. |
27:10 |
Dwyer
100%. Super: |
There's a lot of it. There's an enormous amount
of it now because it's a cheap means of construction, and when it's rendered
with an acrylic render over it, it looks like concrete for all intentional
purposes. Most people would think and believe that they've got a concrete
building. |
27:31 |
Whitmont
and Dwyer walk and look at building |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Phil Dwyer is the President of
the Builders Collective. He showed us this polystyrene clad building in
Melbourne. Earlier this year, a fire broke out in an air conditioner on a
balcony. MARK CARTER: It was fortunate that the fire
happened at a time no one was around. No one was injured. |
27:51 |
Mark
Carter on street. Super: |
The damage to the building was pretty contained
by the sprinkler system, but to us it was a really good example of other
forms of cladding that are out there getting widely used in the industry. |
28:16 |
Fire
brigade call out |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: In Melbourne, the fire brigade
fears that in future polystyrene could be even more of a risk than PE,
because it's used a lot on low rise buildings, and they don't have to have
sprinklers. |
28:26 |
Mark
Carter on street |
MARK CARTER: I think you've only got to go for a
drive out in the suburbs and see the growth in the three to eight story
building apartment sector to have some level of concern. |
28:48 |
Three-storey block exteriors/Shots of fire damage |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: This three-storey block has no
sprinklers. In March, a discarded cigarette butt set alight polystyrene
cladding on the balcony. A resident |
29:00 |
Photo. Man’s burned arm and hard |
was badly burned trying to put out the fire. |
29:14 |
Damaged
balcony |
The burnt balcony was eventually repaired, with
new polystyrene. |
29:20 |
Mark
Carter on street |
MARK CARTER: There's a whole debate going on
around whether it's compliant or not compliant. The issue we want to bring to
everyone's attention is it burns. |
29:27 |
Polystyrene clad building exterior |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: This Melbourne building had to
have fire screens added for protection. A building this high shouldn't
strictly have polystyrene cladding. But it does. A fire engineer and a
certifier both ticked off that it was being used safely. TONY ENRIGHT: This particular building was
subject |
29:35 |
Enright
and Whitmont on street looking at building |
to a fire engineering analysis. A fire engineer has
said that that's okay, and a certifier has checked that and approved it. DEBBIE WHITMONT: What do you think of it? Is it okay? TONY ENRIGHT: Absolutely not. |
29:58 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: There's a view that deregulation
and privatisation in the building industry have gone too far. PHIL DWYER: We decided privatisation |
30:12 |
Dwyer
100%. Super: |
was the best thing in the world. So we privatised
everything, including building surveyors, and also we changed regulation,
dropped red tape and so on. And we've dropped far too much red tape. But
maybe better still, we haven't enforced the regulations that are there. |
30:23 |
Polystyrene
clad building |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: And there's a view that cost
cutting too often wins out over caution. TONY ENRIGHT: We've got parties who are
incentivised by taking risks, and then we've got other parties, who bear the
consequences of those risks if they go wrong. |
30:45 |
Enright
100%. Super: |
So we have, if you will, a builder, a certifier
and a fire engineer who are incentivised to reduce cost. The builder, because
it's going straight on to their bottom line. The certifier, because they want
repeat work from the builder. The fire engineer, because they want repeat
work from the certifier and the builder. And so they're all taking risks,
it's the building owners who bear those risks. |
31:01 |
Second
Torch Tower fire |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: A few weeks ago, the Torch Tower
in Dubai caught fire again - for the second time in two years. Everyone was
evacuated, but it showed that where cladding is risky - something has to be
done about it. The same applies in Australia. |
31:25 |
Dalrymple
100%. Super: |
ADAM DALRYMPLE: I did think more might have
happened and I think Lacrosse for us was unique, |
31:49 |
Lacrosse
fire |
because it was a non-compliant or non-conforming
product on a building it identified a bit of a regulatory failure. So, you
know, we put that on the table. And not a lot had been done. |
31:54 |
Dalrymple
100% |
Since Grenfell, the Victorian Government has established
the Victorian cladding taskforce which has a scope to look into all this
particular stuff, look at a methodology of fixing buildings retrospectively
and developing new legislation moving forward. So it's taken Grenfell to give
us a bit of a kick start, which from our perspective, it's not too late but
it's been a little slow, the reaction. |
32:04 |
Lacrosse
building shots |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Nearly three years on, most of
the combustible cladding is still on the Lacrosse building, with a battle
raging over who should pay the $8 million needed to replace it. |
32:35 |
Whitmont
to camera near Lacrosse building . Super: |
It's not surprising that the question of who
should pay to fix the problem here, soon got bogged down in expensive
litigation. The owners want the builder to pay, but the builder says, not my
fault. And if it is, what about the architect who designed the building, or
the fire engineer who signed off on it, or the surveyor who certified it was
fit to live in. And then there's the occupier of the apartment who let too
many people live in it. And don't forget the overseas traveller who came home
late after a double shift, had a cigarette, and thought he put it out in a
plastic container on the balcony. |
32:51 |
Xenophon
100%. Super: |
NICK XENOPHON: This is an absolute legal
minefield as to who is responsible. The potential litigation, the insurance
claims, the finger pointing between various authorities and contractors is
enormous. |
33:27 |
Dalrymple
100% |
ADAM DALRYMPLE: My view on this is that if I had
bought the building myself and I was living in Lacrosse and I was faced with
this, I wouldn't be very happy either. I'd be looking for someone else to
pay. |
33:42 |
Fire
brigade on call out |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: There are also costs to the
public and fire brigades. |
33:51 |
Dalrymple
100% |
ADAM DALRYMPLE: A building like Lacrosse, which
would normally have a two-appliance response would now have six, and one of
those would be an aerial appliance, a ladder platform with 26 metres reach
and be able to effect rescues from balconies and all those sorts of things. |
34:01 |
Lacrosse
fire |
The fire itself, because it generates a lot of
heat, the panels actually delaminate, and when they delaminate they fall off
the building and you've got a whole lot of airborne parts of the building
raining down. |
34:16 |
Dalrymple
100% |
This happened at Lacrosse, it's happened at every
one of the other fire that’s happened around the world. So what that does,
it’s a whole new danger that the fire fighters are faced with and even the
occupants coming out of the building. |
34:25 |
Fire
brigade call out |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The fire brigade says the
solution has to come at the outset. |
34:37 |
|
ADAM DALRYMPLE: It's my view and I've held this
view for twenty odd years in fire safety, that you've got to get it right at
the front end if you're chasing your tail at the back end something's gone
wrong in between. |
34:46 |
Carter
on street. Super: |
MARK CARTER: You've got this whole chain of
people involved in building design, construction, certification, supply of
materials. You can't tell me, for example, that if this product by all
reports has been used widely in the industry for 10 to 30 years, that major
suppliers of this product in Australia didn't know where this product was
going to end up. To me, I've heard that argument and I don't buy it to be
honest. |
34:57 |
Pallets
of cladding in warehouse |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Four Corners asked three major
Australian cladding suppliers to identify buildings with PE cladding. None of
them did. |
35:23 |
Robert
Marinelli inspecting building site |
Suppliers say it's up to certifiers - like Robert
Marinelli - to sign off on buildings. But Marinelli says certifiers are only
required to make a limited number of site visits. And no one wants to pay
them to come more often. |
35:24 |
Marinelli
100%. Super: |
ROBERT MARINELLI: Well, we can't be on site all
the time. We can't be covering every part of the building, or every screw, or
every component. That expectation's too high. |
35:56 |
Construction/cranes |
So we rely on the subcontractors, the designers
in the process to provide us |
36:04 |
Marinelli
100% |
affirmation or certification of their products
and how they're installed, because we can't be there all the time. DEBBIE WHITMONT: And why is that a problem? ROBERT MARINELLI: Well, you're basically leaving
that accountability to the people who are installing. |
36:10 |
Marnell
in factory |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: But installers - like Seamus
Marnell - say that in most states no one needs a licence to install cladding. |
36:25 |
Marnell
100%. Super: |
SEAMUS MARNELL: Anyone can do it. DEBBIE WHITMONT: What does that mean? Is that
what happens in practice? SEAMUS MARNELL: Yeah, there's people out there
that would have absolutely no idea what they're doing and they're installing
it incorrectly, and they're the people we compete against every day. DEBBIE WHITMONT: Why does that happen? SEAMUS MARNELL: Price, cost I guess. |
36:36 |
Senate
committee hearing |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The Senate inquiry has now been
looking at problems with building products for more than two years. |
36:57 |
Super: |
SENATOR KIM CARR: What struck us on this
committee, and I think I speak for all senators here, is that no one is held
responsible. Everyone has someone else to point the finger at. The product of
deregulation and self-accreditation, this process of abrogation of
responsibility is that no one is responsible. |
37:06 |
|
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The committee's heard evidence
of universal failure - confusion in the building code, a lack of enforcement
and no national licensing. |
37:28 |
Goddard
at committee hearing |
STEPHEN GODDARD, LAWYER: I have more consumer
protection buying a refrigerator than a $1.5million apartment. How can that
happen? DEBBIE WHITMONT: Lawyer Stephen Goddard - who
represents strata bodies - says it's time for the law to impose
responsibility and protect apartment owners. |
37:39 |
|
STEPHEN GODDARD: Gentlemen, you have no option to
kick this down the road another five years. There has to be a level of
accountability. |
37:59 |
|
I know that in the Docklands area there are many
buildings in the same position as Lacrosse. The same is the case in Sydney
and probably on the Gold Coast. |
38:10 |
Quick
shots of GVs Brisbane/ Melbourne/ Canberra/Sydney |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: Audits are now underway across
most of Australia. But it's hard to know what will come of them. An audit in
Melbourne after Lacrosse found cladding on 170 buildings in the CBD alone. And
that didn't include office blocks. |
38:23 |
Carter
on street |
MARK CARTER: The reality is we know we've got a
lot of office and retail complexes out there that it's been widely used on.
So I think we're just at first base really. There's a lot of work yet to be
done. |
38:46 |
Sydney
aerials |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The New South Wales Government
has recently sent out more than 1,000 letters advising building owners to get
fire checks on their cladding. But the next step is unclear. |
38:59 |
Kean
100%. Super: |
MATT KEAN, NSW MINISTER FOR INNOVATION AND BETTER
REGULATION: Well, let's not get ahead of ourselves. We're talking about
hypotheticals. We don't know that the cladding on buildings in this state
that's been identified is unsafe. And if it is unsafe, we don't know whether
or not there are appropriate systems and processes that will ensure that that
cladding is safe. |
39:15 |
Princess Alexandra Hospital exteriors |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: The Queensland Government is
taking the threat of risky cladding seriously. It's identified that Princess
Alexandra hospital, built in the late nineties, is covered in combustible
cladding. It's put on extra safety measures and sent some of the cladding off
for full wall testing. |
39:35 |
Cranes/construction |
Queensland is the first state to introduce
legislation putting responsibility on everyone involved in construction and
signing off on a building. |
40:00 |
De
Brenni 100%. Super: |
MICK DE BRENNI, QLD MINISTER FOR HOUSING AND
PUBLIC WORKS: But what we need to do is make sure that the system that keeps
everybody safe is made more robust again. And it’s clear to me that the
innovation in building products, like cladding on the outside of a building,
has significantly undermined the strength of the building integrity system
and that needs to be restored. |
40:12 |
Lacrosse
and other buildings. Exterior |
DEBBIE WHITMONT: We know there are millions of
square metres of combustible cladding in Australia but we don't know where
most of it is, or what to do about it. It will be a big job. And combustible
cladding is just one symptom of a much more systemic failure in the whole
building industry. |
40:35 |
|
MARK CARTER: We've got all these sort of checks
and balances that have somewhere along the line been missed. |
41:06 |
Carter
100% |
What we've got is a legacy of a lot of buildings
that you've got to question their safety going forward in the future and I
think that's really unfortunate. |
41:13 |
Dwyer
100% |
PHIL DWYER: We need enforcement. You can stack
all the regulations you like on top of one another. If you don't enforce
them, they're not worth anything. DEBBIE WHITMONT: And whose job should that be? PHIL DWYER: That should be our governments, that
we pay an enormous amount of money to, to look after this for us and they
have failed us completely. |
41:23 |
Out
point: |
|
41:45 |
reporter
DEBBIE WHITMONT
producer
PATRICIA DRUM
researcher
ANNE DAVIES
LANI OATAWAY
editor
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assistant editor
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camera
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archive producer
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