By Sonja Elmquist – Greensboro News-Record

A firefighter for 17 years, Jim Robinson has seen fire’s effect on people’s lives over and over.

“I’ve stood on someone’s front yard and I’ve handed someone their Bible out of their rubble pile,” Robinson said. His belief: If everyone had sprinklers, “we could pretty much give them their whole house back.”

Now building his dream house far from the city down a narrow gravel road, he’s not taking any chances. His sprinklers were installed Tuesday.

“Do I want my house to burn down? No way,” Robinson said. “A sprinkler system is like having a firetruck sitting in your front yard 24/7.”

What was a choice for Robinson could eventually be a requirement for anyone building a new house.

An international code-making body recently approved a recommendation that could mean that, beginning in 2012, new one- and two-family homes built in North Carolina might be required to have fire sprinklers.

Commonly seen as invasive, messy and expensive, sprinklers rarely pop up high on home buyers’ — and home builders’ — list of add-ons.

But firefighters say that perception doesn’t match reality and could cost lives.

The N.C. Office of the State Fire Marshal supported the adoption of the requirement in the 2009 International Residential Code, said Kristin Milam, a spokeswoman for the agency.

The International Code Council approved the change at its annual conference in September.

Most states, including North Carolina, use the International Residential Code as the basis for their state and local residential codes.

The National Association of Home Builders opposed the change because of the systems’ potential to discharge accidentally and cause water damage. The systems also need maintenance to remain functional, according to news releases of the association.

The earliest the N.C. Building Code Council could adopt the revised international code would be 2012, Milam said.

Two recent fires in the city illustrate sprinkler advocates’ point, said David Douglas, Greensboro’s fire marshal.

“The circumstances are identical, but the outcomes are dramatically different,” Douglas said. According to the fire department:

Ten months apart, each in their own home, Gwendolyn Williams and Tracy Travis heated oil on their stoves. Each walked into another room, forgetting about the oil in the kitchen.

Williams went to sleep. When her smoke detector went off, she remembered the oil, went to the kitchen, saw it on fire and ran outside to call 911. The only damage to her apartment was a mark on the floor where the pot landed when it fell from the stove. Sprinklers had put out the fire before firefighters arrived.

When Travis went back into his kitchen to check on the oil, he found it on fire. He tried to put it out by spraying it with water from the sprayer on his kitchen sink, but when the water hit the hot oil, the oil erupted, burning Travis and spreading the fire.

By the time firefighters arrived, the kitchen was gutted and there was heat and smoke damage to the rest of the 1,300-square-foot house. The house was condemned.

Travis was hospitalized in the burn center at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center with serious burns to his head and arms.

Although people are cautioned not to put water on a home grease fire, the 12 to 15 gallons of water dispensed by a residential sprinkler is adequate to cool the oil and suppress eruptions caused by steam from the smaller amount of water coming from a sink, Douglas said.

For the past six years, fires in dwellings with sprinklers have caused far less damage than fires in those without, according to fire department data.

Since July 1, fire damage in homes with sprinklers has averaged one fifth of the amount of damage in homes without sprinklers according to data from the fire department.

For the entire six-year period, damage in homes with sprinklers has averaged about $6,000, while damage in homes without them has averaged about $20,000, according to the data.

But minimizing damage is secondary to the main purpose, which is to save lives.

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