1961 – Dec 8, Fire, Hartford Hospital, Hartford, CT — 16
–16 Hartford Hospital News Service. “The Hartford Hospital Fire: Inferno on the 9th Floor.”
–16 Juillerat. “The Hartford Hospital Fire.” NFPA Quarterly, Vol. 55, No. 3, Jan 1962, p. 295.
–16 National Fire Protection Association. Key Dates in Fire History. 1996.
–16 National Fire Protection Association. The 1984 Fire Almanac. 1983, p. 137.
–16 National Fire Protection Assoc. Spreadsheet on Large Loss of Life Fires (as of Feb 2003).
Narrative Information
Hartford Hospital News Service: “On December 8, 1961, a devastating fire engulfed the ninth floor of Hartford Hospital in Hartford, Connecticut. Started by discarded cigarette ash dropped down a trash chute, the fire took the lives of sixteen individuals – including patients, visitors, nurses, employees and one physician – and changed fire codes and building regulations for hospitals nationwide….
“Written and produced by Rebecca Stewart of Hartford Hospital, the half-hour program explains how cigarette ash dropped down a trash chute exploded into a fiery missile that ignited the entire floor. A rolling black cloud of smoke engulfed the hallways within seconds, and people ran for their lives or tried their best to barricade themselves behind doors….
“If anything positive came from the devastation and lost lives of the Hartford Hospital fire, important fire safety lessons were learned that day that helped influence building codes in hospitals around the country. Smoking in hospitals and the use of trash chutes were immediately banned after the fire. Doors in hospitals are now required to use safer positive latches instead of rolling latches which allowed the pressure from fires to push doors open. Building materials such as wallpaper and ceiling tiles must now be made of fire-retardant materials. Sprinkler systems, fire escapes and fire drills are also all mandatory today.” (Hartford Hospital News Service. “The Hartford Hospital Fire: Inferno on the 9th Floor.” 2012 Press Release.)
Juillerat (NFPA Assistant Fire Record Editor): “Fire in the Hartford Hospital, Hartford, Connecticut, on December 8, 1961, killed 7 patients, 4 employees, and 5 visitors. Fire originated in a rubbish chute, burst out a chute door on the ninth floor, and roared down the corridor, feeding on combustible interior finish. Some of the occupants of the ninth floor escaped down the enclosed stairways, others were trapped in rooms. Those of the trapped who kept room doors closed and placed wet bedding around the cracks of the doors survived….
“The metal rubbish chute, where the fire started, was approximately 22 inches in diameter and extended from the subbasement to the thirteenth floor with a 3-inch vent pipe at the top. Also at the top of the chute was one 165- degree sprinkler. An aluminum door opened directly from the chute into the corridor at each floor. The chute doors were flush with the wall and were self-closing by use of a spring-type, side mounted hinge….
“The chute terminated at the subbasement level with a 90 degree elbow and an aluminum door from which rubbish was taken manually and hauled in carts to the incinerator nearby. Rubbish was allowed to collect in the bottom of the chute between incinerating operations, and apparently it was not uncommon for the accumulation to catch fire, possibly from lighted cigarettes being thrown down the chute. These fires were usually extinguished by hospital personnel. The fine department was called if there was a noticeable amount of smoke, or fire was found in the chute. One such previous fire caused some small damage and filled upper floors with smoke. The openings to the chute were almost the same diameter as the chute itself, which permitted stuffing material into the chute in such a way that it might become clogged, which evidently happened in this case, as the single sprinkler in the top of the chute did not operate until well after the fire had broken out on the ninth floor….
“The corridor ceiling on the ninth floor, as on other floors in the hospital, was of combustible fiberboard acoustical tile mounted by an adhesive to gypsum lath. This adhesive apparently was subject to softening under the influence of heat. The 16-inch by 4-foot gypsum lath was attached to suspended metal supports by metal clips at the edges and wire loops in the center. There was a nonfirestopped open space between the ceiling and the concrete floor structure above. This space, about 18 inches high and 8 feet wide, extended over the smoke doors at each end of the center section corridor….
“The 8-foot-wide metal-clad wood-core smoke-stop doors in metal frames at each end of the center section corridor were manually-closing, single-swing doors. Their effectiveness as smoke barriers was reduced by the open concealed space which extended over them above the combustible ceiling.
“In addition to the large stairway in the center section, there was one enclosed stairwell near the corridor intersection in the north section and another in the south section. These stairways were so located that there were dead-end corridors through which occupants would have to travel toward the fire to reach an exit. This is specifically covered in the Building Exits Code which for many years, prior to 1948, provided that ”Exits shall be so arranged with regard to floors that there are no pockets or dead ends of appreciable size in which occupants may be trapped.” Later, this provision was made more specific, and a maximum distance of 30 feet of dead-end travel was permitted. In the Hartford Hospital, this distance was far exceeded….
“Some 5,500 pounds of trash came down the ‘for waste paper only’ rubbish chute each day, sometimes including bottles, ether-soaked rags, rubber gloves, clothing, and other items. On December 8, the employee who handled the rubbish at the bottom of the chute had cleaned it out before going out for lunch. Sometime after returning from lunch the employee went to the chute to remove the new accumulation of rubbish. He later testified that when he opened the door at the end of the chute, he discovered fire in the chute. He immediately went to the main floor level and directed water from a standpipe hose through the door and down the chute. He was aided in this operation by an office employee. Another employee in the subbasement, after being alerted, pulled rubbish from the chute until the burning material dropped down. He then used a garden hose to wet down the rubbish. Various persons reportedly watched the attempt to extinguish the fire for an undetermined period, at least six minutes and possibly longer. No one called the fire department.
“Meanwhile, black smoke was beginning to come out around the chute doors on upper floors a little more than it had during previous chute fires. A nurse on the twelfth floor operated the alarm box on that floor and ordered an aide to put tape around the chuted door to keep the smoke from seeping out. This alarm went directly to fire alarm headquarters at 2:39 P.M.
“On the ninth floor smoke was also noticed coming from around the chute door, and the supervisor of nurses asked another employee to call in to report a fire in the chute as she closed the south smoke door and began closing doors to patients’ rooms. At the time of the fire there were 793 patients in the hospital, 108 of whom were on the ninth floor. There were also reportedly 100 employees and visitors on the ninth floor.
“An employee working in the corridor about 20 feet north of the chute said he saw the chute door blow off and a burst of flame come out. He fled to the north and closed the north smoke door. The second alarm from hospital personnel went in at 2:40 from the ninth floor.
“The exact sequence of events on the ninth floor at this time and the precise conditions in the rubbish chute which caused the burst of flame at the ninth floor probably will never be known. In any case, unburned fire gases appear to have built up in the chute. These gases may have burned, blowing out the chute door on the ninth floor. Why it happened to the ninth floor instead of any other floor is unknown. Possibly the door was not latched. Possibly this door was the weakest in the series of doors up and down the chute. The waterflow from the sprinkler in the top of the chute transmitted an alarm directly to fire headquarters at 2:41.
“Whatever the conditions were in the chute, the blast of fire from the chute door ignited the combustible ceiling tile in the corridor and flames roared down the hallway. It was described by those in the area as ‘like a flame thrower’ or ‘like a blast furnace.’ Flames were reported to have been progressing down the ceiling as the fire spread toa the north and to the south. The fire was so intense that even the waxed linoleum wainscoting was consumed. The north smoke door held, and those on the other side of the door were safe, but at the south smoke door a different story was unfolding.
“A nurse who closed the south smoke door is positive that it was securely latched, and others who had been on the floor said that the door was closed, and they saw smoke coming over the top of the door. Smoke also was spreading beyond the door into the south wings by means of the concealed space above the ceiling. Another question that may never be answered is how or why the smoked door was opened at the height of the fire. Evidence points to the fact that shortly after the fire started on the ninth floor this south smoke door was manually opened, allowing the flames to sweep into the south wings where patients, employees, and visitors were holed up in the rooms. How soon this door was opened and how fast the fire spread was indicated by a ceiling mounted clock at the corridor intersection in the south section. It burned out at 2:43½, just 4½ minutes after the first alarm went in….
“While the rubbish chute fire and the delayed alarm were important factors in the spread of fire to the ninth floor, the primary cause of the great loss of life was the combustible fiberboard ceiling tile, which, when ignited, allowed the fire to spread unchecked down the corridor. How many of the 16 lives lost would have been saved had the corridor ceiling been of noncombustible marterial or how many would have survived had the ninth floor been sprinklered cannot be determined for certain. Probably all of them. If the smoke-stop door had not been opened, all but three lives probably would have been saved. How many of these lives might have been saved if the exits had been properly located is another moot question. Ignition need not come from a rubbish chute fire; it could come from a fire originating in any number of other ways.
“After the fire the hospital hired a fire protection expert to study all the facilities of the hospital and make recommendation to ensure the safety of the patients and employees.” (Juillerat, Ernest Jr. “The Hartford Hospital Fire.” Quarterly of the National Fire Protection Association, Vol. 55, No. 3, Jan 1962, pp. 295-303.)
Newspapers
Dec 8: “The ceaseless battle to save lives and mend bodies went on today at 13-story Hartford Hospital – except in the blackened ninth floor section where 15 persons died Friday [8th] in the smoke of a fire burning with flame thrower fury. Investigators were to resume today trying to determine why fire and an explosion shot out of a trash chute opening, turning the floor tilled with medical and post-operative patients into a visibility zero hell of smoke and flame.
“The state police, city fire department and state fire marshal’s office opened immediate on-the-spot investigations, quizzing witnesses and hospital employes but no cause could be determined. The investigation was halted at midnight to resume today.
“Reports that a lighted cigarette had been thrown into the chute, which runs from the top floor to basement, could not be confirmed. But a hospital official said a memorandum had been posted several weeks ago about a nurse who threw a lighted cigarette into a trash chute. Witnesses told of other fires in the trash chute – but luckily confined. And one said even ‘ether rags’ had been found in the chute although no chemical-soaked material is to be discarded there. Ether is highly flammable.
“Oxygen outlets were found intact and the explosive gas was not blamed for the blast.
“Six patients, five visitors, a resident physician, a nurse and two other hospital employes died on the ninth floor of the modern $10 million stone building. The doctor, nurse and hospital workers lost their lives vainly trying to aid the trapped.
“Heroic acts were countless – orderly Robert Maher, 21, slammed shut a ninth floor fire door and prevented flames from spreading and hysteria was at a minimum.
“Some patients and employes leaned from windows screaming for help as smoke billowed through upper parts of the 13-floor building on the edge of this state capital’s business district. But hundreds of patients – there were 793 in the hospital – were shifted from their beds to other parts of the hospital without ‘panic,’ according to witnesses. Some were carried out with plasma and intravenous feeding bottles still hooked to their bodies. Hospital workers lugged others who could not walk down flights of stairs seated in straight-backed chairs. Those who could walk leaned on nurses and orderlies.
“Assistant housekeeper Wayne Cramer, trapped briefly in an elevator at the ninth floor, said ‘through the elevator window I saw a blast furnace. That’s the only way I can describe it.’
“The tragedy was the second of its type in this city in 16 years. Seventeen lives were lost on Christmas Eve 1945 at the Niles hospital when a short-circuit in flash blaze. And on July 6, 1944, 169 persons died and 682 were injured as fire and a stampede flashed through the big top of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus playing here. It was one of the nation’s worst fire tragedies….
“The fire was brought under control in about an hour after it was discovered. Firemen were hampered by the fact that their extension ladder reached only to the eighth floor, and hoses had to be lugged and grappled up to the ninth floor. Water ran more than an inch deep on the ninth floor by the time the blaze was halted.” (UPI, Hartford (Leonard Granato). “Probe Continues into Hartford Hospital Fire Which Kills 15.” Naugatuck Daily News, 12-9-1961, 1 & 4.)
Dec 10: “Hartford, Conn. (AP) – Investigators remained puzzled Saturday over the cause of the disastrous Hartford hospital fire that killed 15 persons….
“Hartford County Coroner Louis W. Schaefer said some of the bodies showed varying degrees of
burns but death in all cases was the result of carbon monoxide poisoning and smoke inhalation….” (AP. “Officials Fail to Learn the Cause of Hartford Fire.” Lowell Sun, MA. 12-10-1961. p. 10.)
Sources
Associated Press. “Officials Fail to Learn the Cause of Hartford Fire.” Lowell Sun, MA. 12-10-1961. p. 10. At: http://newspaperarchive.com/fullpagepdfviewer?img=55426215&sterm=
Hartford Hospital News Service. “The Hartford Hospital Fire: Inferno on the 9th Floor.” CPBN (Connecticut Public Broadcasting Network), 1-26-2012 Premier. Press Release accessed 11-3-2014 at: http://www.cpbn.org/pressrelease/hartford-hospital-fire-inferno-9th-floor
Juillerat, Ernest Jr. “The Hartford Hospital Fire.” Quarterly of the National Fire Protection Association, Vol. 55, No. 3, Jan 1962, pp. 295-303.
National Fire Protection Association. Key Dates in Fire History. 1996, 2010. Accessed at: http://www.nfpa.org/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=1352&itemID=30955&URL=Research%20&%20Reports/Fire%20statistics/Key%20dates%20in%20fire%20history&cookie%5Ftest=1
National Fire Protection Association. Spreadsheet on Large Loss of Life Fires (as of Feb 2003). (Email attachment to B. W. Blanchard from Jacob Ratliff, NFPA Archivist/Taxonomy Librarian, 7-8-2013.)
National Fire Protection Association. The 1984 Fire Almanac. Quincy, MA: NFPA, 1983.
United Press International, Hartford, CT (Leonard Granato). “Probe Continues into Hartford Hospital Fire Which Kills 15.” Naugatuck Daily News, CN. 12-9-1961, pp. 1&4. Accessed 11-3-2014: http://newspaperarchive.com/fullpagepdfviewer?img=78806635&sterm=hartford+hospital