Wait. Then how does he get paid?

😀 - this, and a few other channels that don’t have advertisements/sponsorship I would be watching/be able to tolerate on the dumb version of KZfaq, I hate advertising /sponsors in YT videos/tv/radio, and when pre-paid YT premium was available in the 🇬🇧, I subscribed to it - would not have been needed on this video. And when they do have them, I don’t see them - part of my fee is paid to the channel and I have to skip through the sponsorship 😠

@@ceciliacarver1311 Likely relies solely on Patreon supporters.

I’ve had some other KZfaq videos that literally had adverts every 2 minutes. And after about 6 minutes I refuse to finish watching as it becomes unwatchable and I certainly don’t subscribe. I don’t mind them getting paid but that’s just abusing my time.

I pay extra for KZfaq premium for no advertising.

@ Dunkleosteus I've known several firefighters over the years. A fire can get out of control in as little as 30 seconds and most fires are not discovered right away. It was the cabbie who first called in this fire not someone in the store, a case in point. Most people, like the lady who testified, always underestimate fire. She was lucky to have such a smart daughter. I'm glad she made her mum see the danger.

Many of these videos have well illustrated how people are often initially disbelieving that a serious disaster is happening. Probably the most telling was the one he did on Pearl Harbor, in which a lot of sailors and others were in utter denial that they were under attack and trying to continue going about their usual business. Especially when things happen suddenly, people are slow to internalize that shit just got real.

If anyone wants to read more about this kind of behaviour, "The Unthinkable" by Amanda Ripley is a good book all about it

Never accept "It's just a little fire." If people are screaming "Fire!" and running out of the store, follow them.

What I took from that, was the fact that she was stubborn, arrogant, and when she could have shouted warnings and saved lives, she didn't.

Unless of course there is no fire and you end up crushed in the frame of the only exit. Keeping calm but taking action.

definitely leave but in a calm and orderly fashion

People tend to suck at risk analysis.

But keep calm

@Lydia130613, whenever I enter a building I look for fire exits.

If you look at old department and shop photos from the early 20thC even you can see all the stock piled up on shelves behind a counter and shop attendants would bring to you what you wanted. Even fruit and grocery stores worked like that until self service stores changed the way retail worked.

It was called ‘server service’ in Australia.

Arrrr the good old locked fire exit

You'd think the fire brigade would carry grinders for cutting metal anyway as a matter of course...

@@PaulRudd1941 I forgot about that, we don't even have cordless grinders at our workplace yet lol. I definitely want one they are the best.

And in 1979.

@@PaulRudd1941 jaws of life were not even around yet, similar devices existed at race tracks but were not yet really a thing in fire fighting tool kits. odds are that is what would be used today on barred windows.

Agreed. We’re all good guys until it’s time to prove it. I’ve experienced that first hand a lot. I’m nothing special.

Had a fire alarm in a hotel where my then girlfriend and I were staying, in the small hours. She went to the toilet and then started fixing herself a little snack, all with the alarm blaring in the room. Meanwhile I threw last night's clothes on (having slept stark bollock naked) while yelling at her to stop messing about and put her shoes on, before I eventually grabbed her coat in one hand and the scruff of her pyjamas in the other, marched her to her shoes, and then pushed her out in to the corridor, where she finally got a clue. Still feel bad about what I had to do to get her out that door.

@@brianb4816 Right! I've been in situations where my life has been actively threatened in the past and froze up before taking any action. It's human.

I was in a white out a few years ago in Michigans Upper Penninsula in a town called Christmas. A towtruck had rear-ended another car on a stretch of highway near the lake when lake-effect snow hit, hard. Both drivers abandoned their vehicles in the middle of the road and just...left the scene, instead of pulling off the road. Their vehicles were not immobile or badly damaged. We narrowly avoided hitting them because I slowed my own car down when I saw the whiteout cloud. I swerved around them and hit the snow bank instead gettibg firmly buried in an 8 foot wall of compacted plow snow. What followed was the longest hour of my life as I frantically dug my car out of the snow bank while cars careened into each other again and again. Never have I been so afraid in my life and Ive been shot at quite a bit (Soldier). My wife and baby were inside the car praying one of the idiot drivers didnt kill us. I threw roadflares onto the road but drivers continued driving into the whiteout cloud at speeds exceeding 55 mph slamming into the tow truck and each other. One old woman literally flew her car off of the street, hit air and landed 40 meters from the road near a river. I narrowly avoided being run down twice, diving out of the way as I tried to get the road flares far enough out to be seen. My wife called 911 and begged the State police to close the road but they didnt want to. They didn't bekieve her. I wisely kept a collapsible shovel in my trunk and used it to dig us out. Then I wobbled my car back and forth freeing it and maneuvered us out so I could drive us to a nearby gas station, half frozen, soaked and covered in ice where I bought some dry clothes and changed. We watched helpless as cars continued flying into each other. I helped those I could but we argued with the State police for over an hour on the phone before they FINALLY closed the road and sent emergency personnel. Some of the other drivers made their way to the same gas station and I angrily asked them why they didnt slow down when they saw the white out. Every single one of them responded along the lines of "Well, I figured that if it was dangerous they would have closed the road." People are morons. Always assume they will do the dumbest possible thing in an emergency. The worst part of this is that I was the only person trying to help anyone. That really stuck with me.

@@blindtraveler844 you had to do it, didn't you.

It also brings back the trauma which, families like mine have spent years getting over. It's an unneccessary gesture which anyone not directly involved has absolutely no right to do. It's a blatant invasion of privacy and intrusion into peoples lives. Anti-Social Twit-Face at it's worst. It's nothing but theatre, an attempt to gain KZfaq recognition and income.

You ok hun?@@philyew3617

@@philyew3617what a ridiculous take on this.

I miss Woolworth... we had one in Downey Ca. I remember eating at the lunch counter..I've always kept a vivid picture of Woolworth's lunch counter in my minds eye...green Formica countertops,chrome napkin holders old school cash register... Better times polite people that cared...

Gravesends branch caught fire in 66

Same thought here

@@jvccr7533 Yup. Me too.

Yeah. Those 37 plus others in the store. That only 10 pershed sees a miracle.

I think they got bored on the roof and went back to their coffees lol...

I agree. Those numbers seem strange, given the barriers and what we hear of the rescue. There's clearly some large life-saving piece here we aren't hearing. Also, I wonder if this death number include folks who died only a bit later in hospital from smoke inhalation and such. There's a lot of unnecessary death here, but it seems like it should be much higher and there's a missing story piece somewhere here.

Just don't panic. If people run, don't do the same in panic. But you better also move - in an appropriate pace.

I guess with really expensive restaurants it's not the cost of the food that concerns people (they won't pay a penny for anything in that situation) but the rarity of the occasion. When there's a waiting list of several months and it's a really prestigious restaurant, people don't want anything to ruin it. That said, in most cases with restaurant fires, I've known the staff to move to temporary premises while the restaurant is refurbished, and I'm sure the patrons on that night would be first in the queue for reservations.

Just grab up your vittles if you're gonna miss 'em so bad. Nobody's gonna notice a few plates and some cutlery's been bogarted.

@@evegreenification I like the way you think!

I've worked in several highrises and they have drills so you know where to go if the alarms go off for real. Some buildings will actually fine you if you ignore the alarm during a drill. I worked on the 24th floor of a 60 story building in Los Angeles when the city did a drill to see how long it would take to evacuate the entire building. My thigh muscles were pretty sore the next day but I was happy to know I could walk down that many flights. With regular drills we only had to go down 5 flights.

I admit I have an issue with it. They said they didn't use conduit. I've never even heard of that. It's CERTAINLY not legal. I HAVE seen it once, an I find it disconcerting.

@@windsofmarchjourneyperrytr2823 What is most often true is that the building may be built to code with conduit, but some subsequent tenant or new owner does some substandard additions to wiring or such, and simply runs Romex where it is not allowed, or even extension cords, possibly spliced. I've been in retail businesses and seen such Gerry-rigging, and wondered how their employees, or customers who are firefighters/police/EMTs don't report them.

silly to ask "Just how bad is it?" about a fire. nobody knows how bad it is right off the bat.

@@billolsen4360 Indeed. Fires aren't judged by how bad they are until after the full extent of the damage can be measured. You don't sit around and wait for it to become lethal, you get out of there before you become a casualty.

@@borderlineiq Dear Camas: This video stated clearly that it was the polyurethane in the furniture that was that cause of this fire, and NOT code violations. And it ALWAYS Gets Me Angry to hear in the aftermath of such a disaster that laws were passed "to make sure that this doesn't happen again". Bull Sh!t !!! Polyurethane is a synthetic, man made material created in an industrial laboratory. Do you really want me to believe that the scientists who created this material didn't test it to see if it was flammable ??? How Absurd !!! I say that they knew quite well but "cut corners" anyway to start making money off polyurethane ASAP. This man made disaster is yet another example that "Capitalists value financial profit over human life." It took 10 years to finally pass a UK law banning the stuff, all the while the manufacturer was undoubtedly raking in profits. But the original manufacturer either knew, or should have known that polyurethane was unsuitable for furniture because it was highly flammable. Why didn't the manufacturer of the polyurethane and/or the furniture manufacturer do Hard Time in prison for all those needless deaths ??? WHY ???

Very poignant. So many people seem particularly angry at Woolworth's, but you know and I know that they were no exception at the time. Many retailers operated with violations like the locked doors, etc. It's just that Woolworth's was a prosperous chain, so made a more apt target, whereas local merchants often did the same dangerous thing, but luckily never killed customers.

Sometimes upsetting images need to be shown to spark change.

@@WouldntULikeToKnow. I hear you. Kinda a comment on the changing nature of media? 9/11 and that footage of the falling man or the Bradford fire and guy totally on fire just walking on the pitch? Reality kinda sucks.

"Hey, while you're suffocating in this noxious smoke and will probably die a horrible, painful, searing death...mind if I take some pictures for my journalistic career lmao"

@@citsune174 I had a head injury from being attacked with a sledgehammer 2 years ago and I needed medical assistance. The two police officers that arrested me(not the assailant), and forced me to swallow and choke on my vomit, and lied in my disclosure, found the whole thing hillarious. Our police officers don't have body cameras in New Zealand, are extremely corrupt and they are determined to get guns. The media is on their side, and is printing numerous misleading articles misrepresenting the amount of gun violence our police face. Filming, photographing and recording those mofos is so so so so so important. I have told my partner multiple times, that if I am in trouble, neither of us is ever to be violent no matter what... he needs to start recording if he wants to help me. Those women were behind bars because of their employer's negligent and evil actions. The reporters couldn't help them get out, but they could help it not be in vain and help them make their suffering have some point and some value.

@@punkybrewstar83 Naturally, I don't mean to make their deaths seem in vain...however, if I was burning to death and the last thing I saw through the smoke and tears was a camera lens, I'd feel slightly vexed.

I was more of a hot dog kid

Very true, and the bags were incredible, they were huge and seemed to have some form of reinforced bottom ready for you to load the bag straight to the brim. You'd never be allowed to serve sweets by the kilogram today :/

Our department stores, and particularly five and dimes, in the states used to sell heated nuts as concessions, much like some businesses do bags of popcorn. The smell of toasting or warming peanuts or cashews was truly intoxicating as it wafted through the store, and nigh impossible to resist unless you were just flat broke.

@@borderlineiq That sounds amazing to be fair. I can't say we had anything that fancy.

@@superspecky4eyes I can't remember how much it cost, as I was a kid, but you could buy maybe several ounces of warm, toasted nuts for probably under $1. Just amazing.

Yes... It's called Bolting the Stable Door after the horse has escaped. Woolworth's along with many others considered safety, of any kind, as an inconvenience. If you watched the video properly they clearly learned nothing from the earlier fire in Colchester did they.

I miss Woolworths. So sad they closed after all those decades

Human nature unfortunately. Think of the Titanic where most passengers were appalled at the thought of getting into rickety lifeboats in the middle of a frigid ocean.

One of the common themes of this video - especially the Pearl Harbor one - is how often people seem to be in denial that a serious incident is actually happening, especially when things start suddenly. Even despite clear warning signs people take some time to internalize that shit did in fact just get real, and want to just keep going about their business. Biased towards normalcy I suppose. Kids I think are quicker to realize and internalize the severity of a situation, less held by this normalcy bias, more easily excitable, and so on.

Yeah, the idea of "It's just a small fire" is completely insane. I've watched enough disaster videos to know that small fires can turn into incredibly huge fires in a very short amount of time. Watch videos about Cocoanut Grove, the Station Nightclub fire, and the Beverly Hills Supper Club fire. Fascinating Horror did them all, and each time it was "just a little fire" which spread very quickly.

I got that into me pretty early for any Incident, i look that i move towards Escaperouts. Not wanna get caught in the middle of a Panic. I zoom out in sudden incidents pretty quick. After initial Shock I get calm, controlling and cold. Right after it's over/taken care of, i brake down.

It's good you remembered that person. RIP

@@dx1450 Yep. In my state, we literally have a fire season. Usually their natural, though sometimes man-made both accidental and arson. Typically, in all cases, they start out small and far away from people.

That just about qualifies as the bystander effect, the BE is more psychological in that people hesitate to come forward to help as they hope someone else will do it instead, but as for assuming that someone else has called the emergency services when no one might have has to be a sub-category of the bystander effect in my opinion.

When i witness a scene of emergency with i automatically ask if help still needed and the Call was was done, loudly. When all is set i mind my own again or engage when needed. I learned this Calls pretty well by now... Stressed People sometimes outright forget the Call or can't do it..

In this day and age nothing would be any different except the useless twats would be standing there filming everything on their bloody phones!

That is the one thing the Red Cross will remind you of again and again if you take one of their life saving courses... YOU call 911 and never assume someone else will.

I’ve seen 911 (999 in the UK) spokespeople on the news say over and over that they’d rather have to thank people for calling and tell them that emergency services have already been dispatched than to never get the call or get it too late.

"New safety regulations are almost always written in blood" such a great phrase.

The fact that they would go on to promote fire detectors is something I also found interesting

Yes, I remember when I was ten, warning my mother that a tornado was coming (the sky was black and the air was absolutely still, not a leaf moving). She pooh-poohed me and told me to eat my dinner. Two minutes later, the tornado sirens went off. I never felt so vindicated. Our area had 26 tornadoes that night.

I am now 20, but I am still very wary about disaster both manmade and natural. I hate being caught out in storms if I notice anything strange about the clouds being in a Tornado prone state as you get further from the big city, but also I also wary about the possibility of fires especially if there is any faulty wiring being that I lived in a neighborhood that had houses from the 60s with old wiring based around the electric coding of that time which didn't require grounding wires and overall had the wiring done much different from today.

Remember the Boxing Day Tsunami and story of the 10 year old girl who warned everyone to get to higher ground when she saw the water recede because she'd just learned about tsunamis in school? That story has stuck with me for years. The tsunami happened on my 5th birthday, and since then, I've always been the hypervigilant one in the group that will say "we need to get out of here" at any sign of danger.

​@@Gail1MarieTWENTY-SIX?! Christ, hope y'all were okay

And you have subsequently emigrated to america?

Was this the Australian Embassy building by any chance? Looking at the smoke it must have been pulled into the building and smoked out the offices.

@@chatteyj Hehehe.

Mom?

It’s mum.

It's depressing how incredibly stupid people can be. I HOPE it was because fires are becoming so relatively rare now that everyone just assumes that it's just a drill or false alarm and they don't take it seriously...but even so that attitude may get them killed one day in a real emergency.

The fun bit is the cyanide in the smoke. Don't be in a closed space with that stuff.

burning trash is so much better than landfills, we should move to zero landfill

@@chatteyj Indeed. Since those hydrocarbons are already above the ground, it provides us with circular energy when burned. Landfills are a waste of space, and emit a similar amount of greenhouse gasses like carbondioxide and methane, without getting anything in return. As you probably know, leaving it to rot and burning it are both oxidation processes.

i saw a demonstration from the local fire department and they had left a lit cigarette on a chair that was made with the same material. it went up like a roman candle and destroyed everything in the room.

@@chatteyj Burning trash is terrible for the environment. Speaking as a ‘beyond organic’ farmer, one of the worst things my livestock are exposed to is the smoke from my neighbors that insist on burning all their trash.

what a fool, the chemicals used as fire retardation is poisonous to humans, "Act" = cashcows

Funny you should say that…I’m an American who remembers Woolworth’s well, but had no idea they expanded beyond North America!

Aircraft and buildings - make sure you know how to get out - imagine being blindfolded - which is what would happen with thick black smoke - plus choking, unable to breathe. Seconds count.

Yeah, no. The hell with that. Fire can not only outrun you, it can outrun you DRIVING. Please see books on the Paradise, CA fire as well as Fire Lover by Joseph Wambaugh. I heard a fire alarm once. I was on the 3rd floor of a business building. It's 3 beeps in the US, btw. I was down the stairs and out the door within 30 seconds. False alarm but I'd rather be wrong than right on that one.

I live in Ontario, where earthquakes are extremely rare and small. We had one about a decade ago and it happened while I was at work. The whole building started to shake and my entire office...we just stood there staring stupidly for several seconds. It was only when someone from IT, who had grown up in Iran, yelled, "what are you all doing? It's an earthquake, get out!" Of course, the earthquake was minor, but ever since then, I've never been so smug about how I'd react in an emergency like that.

Yeah that's kinda odd. The vast majority of humans where I live are very startled by alarms. Ofc these humans had what are known as fire drills a few times per year in grade school.

I remember being in a Home Depot store when the fire alarm went off. Naturally I started to leave and someone came on over the PA saying that the alarm system was being serviced. I noticed that very few people started walking toward the exits.

A few years ago I was in a Walmart and while I was paying for my stuff the manager started telling people to evacuate. There was no alarm at first, but the manager and staff quickly started instructing everyone to get out. Since I had just finished paying it didn't really affect me that much, but the lady behind me started complaining that the cashier should ring her stuff up first, even as the alarm started going off. When the cashier and manager told her no, they need to evacuate, she huffed and said, "Well how long is this going to take?" They were like, "Lol, it's an emergency, we don't know." It wasn't a fire in this case, it was a gas leak, and ultimately everything was fine, but there was still a good reason to need to evacuate. Fire or no fire, if staff and management are telling you to evacuate, I wouldn't argue or question it. They certainly aren't doing it for funsies, just to mess with your day. I'd rather be safe. What baffled me though was how many people just congregated right at the exit, some customers and staff lighting up to smoke, knowing that the reason for evacuation was a gas leak.

It's a gross invasion of privacy and brings back the trauma suffered by families like mine who spent years getting over it. People who were not directly involved should keep their nose out. It's an example of (Anti)Social Media at it's worst.

WHY? All he's doing is copying other people's work and trying to make money from KZfaq advertising.

We had Woolworths in Ireland too, and they were discount stores.

@@gerardacronin334 Still have them here in Germany.

@@kpanic23 That's so odd, says they still exist as discount stores in Mexico too. F.W. really knew how to market himself, lol.

While they didn’t push the discount thing particularly, the UK ones were very much at the lower end of the market, in some ways the torch was carried through into pound shops and the out of town bargain stores.

@@johnd6487 Ah gotcha. When I heard they occupied 6 floors and had a furniture department I at least thought they'd be higher end lol. I forget how expansive even the most basic discount stores were then.

IMO if Sears had realized the internet when they should have, There would be no Amazon Empire. They would just be a book store online. Amazon today is basically the Sears catalog of yesterday. Basically everything under the sun you can order it(though you cant order a flat packed house on Amazon, Sears did that for a bit). Suits at Sears really dropped the ball on internet shopping, Even though they had the back end knowledge to make it work.

@@filanfyretracker Yeah, look at cab drivers. I don't believe any of them drive any better, tho. In fact, kind of scary-bad both times (of 3) I've been in them. You could never get one when you need one and they're gone now.

@@filanfyretracker There seemed to be nothing you couldn’t order from the big Sears catalog or its smaller specialty catalogs back in the day, including English and Western saddles and live chicks from the farm catalog. 🐥

@@filanfyretracker Are you sure you can't buy a house from amazon?

@@spiritmatter1553 I remember going to the back of a Sears store and discovering sample gravestones; you could have one custom-engraved and delivered. Talk about "cradle to grave"!

A strange response to a video showcasing how his desire for money and prioritisation of property over people directly resulted in people dying...

probably also find all the information on fines, I dunno about where you are but in some cities chaining up a fire exit is not a cheap citation from the fire marshal. Management may not care about chiding, but once you start talking dollars and cents(or your country's equal to that term if not in the USA) that gets more attention.

I recently ended up in a work meeting ( really more like a tribunal) and grilled why I told my supervisor that he couldn't lock a lighted emergency exit while the building was occupied after he had. :-/ It was just stupidity. I couldn't believe it.

@@marthapackard8649 Good grief.

When you find a second violation has occurred in defiance of code, go to a higher local authority to get action. If that fails or in lieu, contact a news department in either a newspaper or radio or television and push to get a story on local fire code dangers. They're all eager to report health inspections of restaurants, but fire code problems are a sleeper. Don't have to be.

@@marthapackard8649 My friend's sister works at a nursing home. She looked out the window toward a restaurant next door and saw that a car--parked right next to the occupied restaurant--was on fire. She grabbed a fire extinguisher, ran over, and put it out. She was scolded by her boss for using the nursing home's fire extinguisher, because the fire didn't happen on nursing home property. Some people are idiots.

Plainly difficult does a similar form of videos that also discuss the legacy and historical impact of disasters, if you’re interested. I do agree though, it’s so hard to find channels that cover morbid content without playing into jump scares and horror music.

I binged this channel when I first found it. Took a few days to watch all of them, because of work and all. I agree too, I love the way he doesn't dramatize these stories. This is one of my favorite channels.

I binged all of his videos when I found the channel too. If you haven't found Mr. Ballen on KZfaq, you are in for a treat. He's an ex Navy Seal that tells fascinating true stories of things people have been through.

I’ve been bin watching too...

Respectfully, don't get complacent. I've seen all kinds of stupid long after this. From illegal fire drapes in theaters to overcrowding, to locking doors during business hours.

I remember one around ten years or so ago at a British Heart Foundation used furniture store in Kidderminster. From alarms sounding to the place being completely engulfed and the roof caving in took around ten minutes. I believe that one was an electrical problem too.

There was a horrific fire at a sofa outlet in Charleston, South Carolina over a decade or so ago. Nine firefighters lost their lives. It was a litany of mistakes, but part of the issue that let what the fire spread is exactly what you described.

@@doryna_sira Oh, yes, that was the first one that popped to mind. Horrible. I mean, it's sometimes part of a firefighters *job* to go in there and put life on the line, but still, every firefighting life lost is a tragedy. Back the Red!

Fabric stores too. I remember going to a fabric outlet & thinking it would horrible if it caught on fire.

Great comment! I agree a lot could be said about the furniture store catastrophe’s

Im from Manchester too and i remember the fire being on the TV ect as i was 9 yrs old at the time , i remember the tv showing the staff trapped behind barred windows screaming for help ..its a sight and sound that has never left me!

From Manchester also and yeah I fondly remember those 2

Mega tastic. Sean. Matt. Me too. I would of been 7yrs old and remember shopping with my mum in town on that day and being FASCINATED with all the commotion (we were safely on the other side of Piccadilly Gardens waiting for bus home) I don't remember much else and I can't remember ever talking about it with her before she died when I was 14 but I'm glad it changed a few policies so those life's lost weren't in vain ✌

@@dizzydevil547 oh no that's so sad. Bless their souls ❤️

@@ChorltonandtheWheelies oh that's so sad and awful. Yeah you would remember it being that old. Aww God bless your mum's soul ❤️

Thank you: I also remember that but couldn't remember the name!

I have the associated book. There was a series of C4 series looking at disasters including Blaze, including trains (Derail), buildings (Collapse), road (Crash), and maritime (Mayday).

I read a book entitled "Blaze" and I believe a Woolworth's fire story was mentioned here, but not sure it's the same one as the one in the book Said it was caused by a crisp-chips-fire. A young girl who was in the fire brigade lost her life. I no longer have the book, so it might have the one in Colchester. We used to have at least 2 Woolworth's in Atlanta and 1 in Chamblee near me. Fortunately, none caught fire; they just went out of business-or moved elsewhere. I miss them.

Aye, full of tat. No wonder they went bust. Lol

@@ZJS0113 The former "five and dime" in the US has been replaced by the dollar store. Inflation, don't you know.

@@Gail1Marie yeah, most of the shops in small towns in the UK are some form of £1 shop

As the saying goes "it's better to be safe than sorry"!

Absolutely. "Just a little fire" is the same as "just a little pregnant". Either the building is on fire or it isn't.

Decades ago, I was working in an electronics repair shop. This newly hired 'tech' who was studying to be an Electrical Engineer laid a hot soldering iron on a stack of that old excelsior paper packing, instead of putting it into its stand. He started screaming, "The building is on fire we're all going to die!" He was less than 15 feet from the open front door, and he was standing next to the bench covered in burning paper. He was also blocking access to a fire extinguisher. I shoved him out of the way, grabbed the burning pile ant took it outside. I stomped it out, then went back in to make sure there was no other damage. He was still babbling like a little girl, and demanding that I call the fire department. The last I heard, he was working for RCA, designing TV tuners just before it was sold to France.

In a cramped space you really cant be too careful. In an open environment just about anyone can outrun fire.

I guess it was a generational thing but back then people her age weren't educated on the dangers of fires in schools as her daughter's generation and later. We were taught that any fires in a building were serious and there was no such thing as a "little fire" because if someone was saying "fire" that little fire was going to be a big fire in seconds and the smoke was about to kill anyone in the building in minutes.

@@robertsteinbach7325 The old WWII era wood barracks that I took Basic in were a complete loss in about four minutes, due to decades of waxing bare wood floor. Four minutes was barely enough time to evacuate both floors. That's why 'Fire Sentry' was a critical duty and that no one was allowed to smoke in those 30 year old firetraps. If a Fire Sentry fell asleep, he would end up behind bars.

Mancunian = people who live in Manchester?

YEAH, there was a video showing it. Absolute History, Dangers of the mid-century home. So they set one of these things on fire on purpose...

Polyurethane foam releases hydrogen cyanide gas when it burns--the stuff they use in gas chambers to execute people. The airlines once used polyurethane in airplane seat cushions until they realized that some people in plane crashes were being killed by the fumes from burning polyurethane.

This is true.

Feel better soon 😊😊

Ohio? I can't find anything about it in the local newspaper archives.

I was about to ask where you have seen Woolworths recently, because I thought they’d all closed down years ago. But then I twigged what you meant. I’m surprised that there’s so many stores without adequate fire suppression systems. I can’t say I’ve noticed, but I’m sure I’ll be keeping a keener eye on such things.

You weren't delivering smoke alarms by any chance?😂

HUGE no-no in the States, but please note, you'll see locked doors to this day. God forbid they should pay security if that's a concern... They can be very hard to open as it is, much less FAST. I think US stores should use panic bar doors more often for this reason.

@@windsofmarchjourneyperrytr2823 Many newer US stores and factories now have alarm delayed fire doors. When you push on the panic bar, first an alarm sounds and then from 15 to 30 seconds later the lock releases. This solves the shoplifting problem as the alarm will draw employees (or a factory supervisor) before the door can be opened yet still leaves a usable fire exit. It would be the longest and most harrowing 15 seconds of one's life waiting on one to open as a fire approached and hoping it didn't malfunction...

@@brianr1686 . Not sure what I delivered, I was hauling a white trailer full of palletised brown boxes, Ironically they all got burnt in the fire.

He gave done that already? Have you checked?

It's up. Already watched it.

@@felipecardoza9967 really? I thought I had watched all of them and I don't remember seeing it. I guess I will have to look again

Yeah I just looked through again and I don't see it. Please share the link if I'm missing it

@A G I was wrong. It was Plainly Difficult that covered the 1972 Rapid City dam failure and flood. I frequent both channels often and often forget who covered what. Sorry.

Same with my father. He would forbid me to go into certain buildings after inspecting them. I didn't know why... and now I do. Some people in town I can't look in the eye.

That literally gave me nightmares for days after watching the news casts......and that Facebook live feed from the top floor.......I will never be able to live above the 7th floor.......maybe not even that high. 👎😰

And the worst thing is the fire brigade call centre were stupidly telling people NOT to get out. Even worse, at the enquiry the dunder-Head of the London fire Brigade said that everything was done by the book and nothing needed to be improved!

Were they built like factories? Because those are all the rage in Chicago. Very expensive as the area went up, BUT they already have sprinklers and HUGE elevators. Bigger than your living room. Very solid buildings.

Hello 👋 Susan, how are you doing?

Done in by WalMart in many cases, unfortunately.

Right? I seem to recall they said the same about the Summerland leisure centre fire, before it spread unseen through the walls and ignited the highly flammable plexiglass ceiling. Really, there's no such thing as a "small' fire. Most are beyond fighting with an extinguisher or a bucket of water within around 90 seconds - indeed I remember a 'Fire Kills' PIF from the early 80s that stated exactly that, and how if you discover a fire your priority should be to GTFO and call 999 rather than messing around trying to put it out.

A "little fire" on the stage curtains at the Iroquois Theatre and the Station Nightclub turned out to be - in the words of Great White's lead singer during the latter incident - "not good".

They must imagine something like a few papers burinng in a waste basket and employees just slow to fetch a fire extinguisher. Such a dunderheaded view of fires. And it is still common.

@@stevenstice6683 Within weeks of the Station fire, a similar fire erupted in the Minneapolis night club The Fine Line (pyrotechnics ignited the ceiling). You've never heard of it because Minneapolis requires sprinklers in any venue that holds 200 or more people. The sprinklers came on and the patrons and staff evacuated with no loss of life. Sometimes the fire codes get it right.

A fire doubles in size every 30 seconds. Shit gets bad FAST.

I live in Chicago, IL USA and all our Woolworth's had wooden floors off to the side w/sliding ladders so stock could be pulled down by employee/Management, even into 1980's/1990.

Good morning! It's 11:50 am here

Its part of the same reason some of the shoppers didn't react to people shouting fire. They just didn't think it would happen to *THEM*. Disbelief is a very common reaction to sudden events like this, people saying or thinking "this cant be happening...." or standing in shock trying to process what they can see. The management didn't think a fire was a real threat, so they compromised fire security in the name of loss prevention.