In Depth

Disaster Lessons

How the Great Chicago Fire and Other Disastersincluding 9/11Have Led to Improved Safety Practices

By CSO Contributor

October 01, 2006 — CSO —

It might have started when a cow kicked a lantern into a pile of hay. Some say it was caused by a

meteor shower. These are two of the theories as to how the Great Chicago Fire of Oct. 8, 1871, started.

The fire that burned for two days, swept over 2,000 acres, killed more than 250 people and caused

$2.67 billion worth of damage in 2005 dollars, is commemorated in the United States every October.

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Fire Prevention Week, this year from Oct. 8-14, puts a spotlight on fire prevention awareness. Fire

departments and schools bring safety lessons to the forefront for students, communites and

workplaces through events and activities. It is an opportunity to raise awareness about fire prevention

and what can be done in the workplace to ensure the safey of building occupants.

Today's safety codes owe much to yesterday's disasters. No one knows for certain how the Chicago fire

started, but what is known is how it was able to spread so rapidly. The fire's destruction was aided by

the buildings' close proximity to each other and because buildings and sidewalks were made of wood.

The wind blew the fire towards the commercial lumber and coal yards along the river, providing

additional fuel to feed the blaze. Fire departments weren't notified right away and so the fire burned

unchecked.

The massive destruction in 1871 was a warning shot, but it took more than that for change to sweep

national building safety rules, says Casey Grant of the National Fire Protection Association. A second

fire ripped through Chicago just a few years later, in the same area. "The city began allowing rebuilding

to occur but they weren't being smart about their zoning and the construction was haphazard," Grant

says. "The second fire was the ultimate wake-up call. There were a lot of people crying that a change

was needed."

And Chicago was not the only 19th-century American city to be crippled by fire. An 1872 fire in

Boston's financial district spread in part because of closely-packed wooden buildings similar to

Chicago's. A recent Boston Globe piece on the history of the Boston fire notes that, before the fire, the

city's fire chief unsuccessfully had sought more firefighters, equipment and water supplies to respond if

flames hit the city's vulnerable wooden structures. When fire spread, one thousand people were made

homeless.

After fires damaged Chicago, Boston, Baltimore, Atlanta, Seattle and after the 1906 earthquake in San

Francisco drew attention to weak buildings and vulnerable neighborhoods, cities around the nation

passed new codes for street widths and building construction. Street width is important because it

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