Water Pressure?

Before I start, can I ask you and anyone else to disregard Corky's bastard reply? He doesn't like me very much... :(

I'm afraid I am no expert. I admit that. The primitive knowledge I have has almost solely originated from my years of researching fire fighting at the library but even more so the net. I am definitely not a qualified plumber. Sorry if that disappoints you.

This is probably a long shot but I figure that the way water moves from an exploded water tank will depend on how close the tanks are to an elevator shaft or stairwell or window. Those tanks in 'Inferno appear to be a fair distance from any shaft which suggests that the water would at least initially spread horizontally throughout the floor. However Doug Roberts and SFFD Battalion Fire Chief Mike O'Halloran had set the explosives to blow the water tank floors out (floors 137 and 138) which would give the water strong downwards momentum to filter through the building and extinguish most if not all of the fires. In the climatic explosion scenes we see holes in the ceiling of floor 135 aka The Promenade Room with water gushing down which supports this theory. However we also see water rushing down the stairwells and at least 1 of the internal elevator shafts as well as through the windows. However even if water doesn't directly reach the fires, the heat from the fires would turn the water to steam which smothers the fires by starving the fires of oxygen. The water would also dampen any unburnt materials which would rob any remaining fires of fuel. The evaporation of water would also cool the air by evaporation cooling which would reduce the heat plume from the fires. This makes a crucial difference when a flashover or backdraft is imminent.

My interest in firefighting originated when I was 5 years old. That was when I first saw 'Inferno. It was also when I first started watching Fireman Sam and Fire! Trapped On The 37th Floor which was the classic documentary film of the First Interstate Bank Fire in the First Interstate Bank Tower (nka Aon Center) in Los Angeles on 4th and 5th May 1988.

I use to create Lego versions of the Glass Tower and First Interstate Bank Tower and the World Trade Center. To re-enact scenes from 'Inferno and Trapped, I would pretend 1 of my wardrobes was a stairwell exit, another wardrobe would be an elevator and another would be a storage room were I pretended the fire starts. I used bits of string and K'Nex to recreate the Breeches Buoy from 'Inferno. My teddy bears would be rescue victims. I also used Lego and string to recreate the Scenic Elevator for my Glass Tower. I used toy helicopters to rescue the janitor from the 50th floor of my First Interstate Bank Tower and I also used toy helicopters for the Scenic Elevator and Breeches Buoy rescues on my Glass Tower. I also used a toy helicopter to lift my toy Battalion Chief O'Halloran to the top of my Glass Tower to blow up the water tanks.

I created Lego fire hydrants. I also collected toy fire engines. I would link my toy fire engines together using shoe laces which would act as relay hoses. I placed a toy multistory car park next to my Lego towers. I would also tie shoe lace relay hoses from my toy fire engines to a pillar on the ground floor of my toy car park. I pretended the ground floor pillar was the Fire Department Connection Inlet for the dry riser standpipes in my toy car park and Lego towers. I pretended other toy pillars were dry riser standpipes. I tied another shoe lace from my toy hydrant to my toy fire engine to act as a soft suction hose. I tied other shoelaces to my toy fire engines to act as attack hoses and I also tied shoe laces to my toy dry riser standpipe to act as attack hoses and I also used curtain ties as attack hoses. I also tied bits of string to my toy fire engines to act as booster hoses. My Lego fire engine came with an actual toy hard suction hose and an actual toy booster hose and actual toy fire extinguisher and an actual toy portable jockey pump. I used a shoe lace soft suction hose to link my Lego fire engine to my Lego portable jockey pump. I pretended to pump water from my bath through my Lego hard suction hose and into my Lego portable jockey pump. My Meccano fire engine came with an actual toy attack hose and an actual toy fire extinguisher. I often also tied extra lengths of shoe laces to my soft suction hoses, relay hoses, hard suction hoses and attack hoses to emulate their real life extension. I also made a toy portable jockey pump out of K'Nex and I used my shoe lace soft suction hose to link it to my fire engines. I also tied another shoe lace to my K'Nex portable jockey pump to act as a hard suction hose to pump water out of the bath and into my K'Nex portable jockey pump. I also pretended my K'Nex portable jockey pump was a chainsaw!

Another concern I forgot to mention in my original post was if the water pressures in 'Inferno were not possible, then that would suggest there was very little if any hope of saving the World Trade Center towers eventhough the Twin Towers with 110 floors were both 30 storeys smaller than the Glass Tower which had 140 floors.

p.s Corky, I don't need anymore trolls on my topics. Go play some more gmod no life!

p.p.s There was actually a similar topic to this that I contributed replies to about the firefighting setup in 'Inferno which had discussion about both the firefighting procedures and water pressures which for some reason no longer exists. It was called "Is/was it standard procedure". Nobody lynched that one but of course sods law means that a similar topic made by me gets lynched... :(

Sorry for the late reply, NOTACLERK1. The SFFD, in 'Inferno do indeed attach their attack hoses to the building pipe system in the Glass Tower. This is the standpipe riser which is universally used by fire fighters in real life for any fire in a multistory building. As part of the National Standard Of Fire Protection, all standpipes are supplied with water directly from the mains by a high pressure fire pump in the building in question. This can also be supplemented by a secondary jockey pump in the same building. However in most fire departments around the world, it is standard procedure in any high rise fire for the fire department to hook their fire engine to the Fire Department Connection Inlet of the standpipe/sprinkler riser. This ensures that there is a backup water supply should the buildings own fire pump prove ineffective or fail altogether. As in real life, the SFFD in 'Inferno also hooked their fire engines up to street hydrants to secure their water supply. Its very easy to overlook the use of the Fire Department Connection in 'Inferno but that was also utilized to charge the standpipe. As I said in my first post, the free-standing Fire Department Connection Inlet (with hoses still attached) can be seen when Chief O'Halloran is leaving Glass Tower lobby at the end of the film.

Fire Department Connection Inlets are typically designed for hoses as small as the 2 1/2 inch diameter hoses (layflat jets) and as large as the 5 inch diameter hoses (relay hoses). Rarer Fire Department Connections are designed for 1 1/2 hoses (forestry hoses) and 6 inch hoses.

Standpipe risers have 2 purposes in buildings. Firstly, they supply fire hoses via the outlets on each floor and last but not least, standpipe risers also supply the automatic fire sprinklers. There are some buildings were sprinklers have their own standpipe riser, fire pump, jockey pump and Fire Department Connection Inlet but increasingly these days, sprinklers share the same standpipe riser that supplies fire hose outlets. Standpipe/sprinkler risers come in both "Dry" and "Wet" forms. In a "Dry Riser", the standpipe/sprinkler riser is kept dry until a fire breaks out. Once a fire alarm has been activated the buildings fire pump automatically kicks in and feeds water into the standpipe and sprinkler system.

Another wetting process occurs when the glass tube in the fire sprinkler head melts which causes compressed air to rush out of the standpipe and sprinkler branch piping. With less air pushing down, a clapper valve opens and water from the buildings jockey pump rushes into the standpipe and sprinkler system. Sensors in the jockey pump register a drop in water pressure which in turn also automatically activates the buildings main fire pump into supplying the standpipe riser and sprinklers. If any fire alarm sensors fail to activate the fire pump, it can be manually activated and backed up by the Fire Department charging the standpipe/sprinkler riser with water from their fire engines.

"Dry Risers" are used in buildings which are vulnerable to water freezing and bursting pipes. "Wet Risers" more simply are kept supplied with water from the buildings fire pump and jockey pump around the clock. These systems are the main systems used in buildings were pipe bursting freezes are rare or non-existent.

Regarding the hose outlets, the most common types are for 2 1/2 inch attack hoses. However some buildings instead have 1 1/2 inch and/or 3 inch outlets. In 'Inferno, the building had both 1 1/2 inch and 3 inch hose outlets as stated by Doug Roberts following Chief O'Halloran's arrival at the Glass Tower. Also as standard in most countries, buildings also have hose cabinets which contain both fire extinguishers and attack hoses with built in connections to the standpipe/sprinkler riser. These attack hoses range from 1 inch (booster hose) to 3 inch (large diameter hose) although 1 1/2 inch "forestry hose" is the most common. The buildings own hoses are often referred to as "occupation hoses" and are stored either rolled on a hose reel or pegged accordion style (aka flaked).