MGM Grand Fire

¶ … fire at MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The writer discusses the cause of the fire as well as many aspects of the response from emergency management. There were five sources used to complete this paper. One of the biggest fears that travelers have when they check into a hotel is fire. The thought of a fire breaking out in a high rise hotel and killing people before they can be rescued goes through the mind of millions of tourists each year.

Often they calm themselves with the reminder that it is a one in a million chance. That may have been what the patrons of the MGM Grand Hotel believed on the night before November 21, 1980(Koch, 2000). By the 22nd they knew the odds had caught up and a fire broke out. The hotel fire made international news and provided the basis for fire studies throughout the country. Following the fire at MGM many hotels changed their protocol and many fire departments worked to improve their response time.

Everybody did not agree with the changes however. The decision makers at MGM argued that placing a two dollar smoke detector in each room even after the fire occurred was to much of an expense. The MGM Fire has been recorded as the second worst hotel fire in the history of the nation. When all was aid and done almost 100 people were dead and many others injured. The MGM fire has been credited with opening the public's eyes to the fact that fire and smoke do kill people.

When the fire occurred the Nevada Governor appointed a committee of fire prevention experts that included building inspectors, government officials and firefighters to examine the fire's causes and things that could have been done to minimize the damage and death that it caused (Koch, 2000). One of the biggest issues that came to the public following the MGM Grand fire was the fact that it did not have a sprinkler system installed.

Five months after the MGM fire, the Nevada Legislature passed a bill mandating sprinkler systems in all hotels, motels, office buildings, and apartments higher than 55 feet and requiring sprinklers in showrooms and other public gathering places of more than 15,000 square feet (Koch, 2000)." One possible reason for the laid back attitude about hotel fires, from the prevention measures to the alleged slower than possible response time to the fire was the fact that until the MGM burned there had only been two recorded deadly fires in recent history in that county.

Following the MGM fire there were many changes made both in preventative measures and legislature to insure a similar tragedy does not happen in the future. Today you'd have a better chance drowning from the room's sprinklers than you would being burned to death in a fire," said one panel member.

"The MGM, which was at 99% capacity the day of the fire, only had sprinklers in a galley and in the basement, areas where the fire was stopped dead in its tracks by the heavy flow of water (Koch, 2000)." In addition the MGM Grand had an air system that allowed toxic fumes to be piped throughout the building.

There were no fire control rooms in the building either which meant there was no central way for the hotel to contact the hotel guests and advise them on measures to stay safe until they could be rescued." Today, every major public building has such rooms with computers that can pinpoint the origin of fires and vent smoke out of areas to help firefighters (Koch, 2000)." More than two decades later the fire is still remembered.

The Nevada Lions' Burn Care Center at the University Medical Center devoted lots of time helping fire victims that day and currently still donate money to the treatment of fire victims (Tragedy Remembered Through Gift MGM Fire Fund to Help Burn Victims (http://www.umc-cares.org/press/030501_mgm.html). The investigation found many bodies that were just feet from doors that would have led to escape.

"All they had to do was push the door open," Burns said 20 years later from his office at Fire Department headquarters (MGM GRAND FIRE: Horror can't be forgotten (http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2000/Nov-19-Sun-2000/news/14842491.html)." Though there were many rumors over the years that the fire was started by arsonists the true cause according to fire investigators who reported faulty wiring as the culprit. The wires in the.