| A firefighter at the mall where sprinklers extinguished the fire |
19 sprinkler heads prevented disaster
A fire in a shopping mall in Vilnius, Lithuania, was extinguished by a sprinkler system.
The fire began in a deep fat fryer in the Chilli China restaurant in the Akropolis shopping mall on Tuesday, 6th October.
The fryer was not fitted with a local suppression system so the fire got into the duct, which was coated with fat. It spread through the duct and into the building, where 19 sprinkler heads operated to control and extinguish the fire.
While good practice would have been to fit a local fire suppression system for the deep fat fryer, it's clear that the sprinkler system prevented a disaster. 3,000 people were evacuated and one girl was taken to hospital suffering from smoke inhalation.
Damage was limited to €150,000 and the shopping centre was re-opened the next day.