20  The Grenfell Tower fire

quickly than they should have. Moore-Bick recommended that owners

and managers of every residential building containing separate dwell-
ings, whether HRRBs or not, should carry out inspections of all fire
doors every 3 months to ensure they comply with the applicable legis-
lative standards and are fitted with effective self-closing devices in good
working order. The recommendation was extended to ensure that the
front entrance doors to individual flats in HRRBs should comply with
current standards.

Sprinklers
The inquiry report did not make any recommendations about the use
of sprinklers, as it was not proven that a sprinkler system would have
prevented the fire from spreading at Grenfell Tower. It was, however,
noted that such systems have an integral part to play with respect to
fire safety measures and the report reiterated the advice provided by
the coroner, who presided over the Lakanal House fire inquest, that the
government should encourage housing providers responsible for HR-
RBs containing multiple domestic premises to consider fitting sprinkler
systems.

Lifts
On the night of the Grenfell tragedy, firefighters were unable to operate
the lift override mechanism. The inquiry recommended that the own-
ers/managers of HRRBs should be statutorily obliged to undertake
the regular inspections of all lifts and this should include testing of the
override mechanism designed to allow firefighters to take control of the
lifts in emergencies. The inquiry further recommended that the results
of these inspections and tests should be reported to local fire and rescue
services on a regular basis.

As-built drawings
Moore-Bick acknowledged that the Fire Brigade were not unduly
hampered by the absence of accurate floor plans in its attempt to fight
the fire at Grenfell Tower. However, the view was taken that the lack of
floor plans could have far more serious consequences, and therefore, the
inquiry recommended that the owner of every HRRB be required, by
law, to provide the local fire and rescue services with up-to-date plans,
in both analogue and digital formats, of all floors of the building iden-
tifying the location of key fire safety systems. Each building should also
contain a premises information box, the contents of which must include
 The Grenfell Tower fire  21
copies of the up-to-date plans and information about the nature of any
lift that could be used by the fire and rescue services.

Phase 2 inquiry
At the time of writing this book, the Phase 2 inquiry had been delayed by
the effects of the coronavirus pandemic and the inquiry hearings were on-
going. However, the evidence given to date has revealed that Arconic, the
firm that manufactured and sold the external combustible ACM cladding
cassettes used on Grenfell, were aware that the cladding was combustible.
The Reynobond panels came in two types – cassette and rivet-fixed – and
in 2004 a fire test showed that there were vast differences between the
two forms with the cassette version performing significantly worse than
the rivet-fixed. The test data was not shared with the relevant certification
bodies, and both types were sold under the same fire safety accreditation,
even though it had been shown that the rivet-fixed had significantly better
fire resistance performance. A British Board of Agrément (BBA) certif-
icate, issued in 2008, made no distinction between the two versions of
Reynobond PE, and even though the cassette variant did not achieve any
rating in the 2004 test, it was presented as having a Euroclass B rating. This
rating was used as the basis for the BBA giving the cassette variant a UK
class 0 rating which meant that it was safe for use on buildings over 18 m
in height.26
Arconic also knew that there had been several fires in the Middle East
in 2013, where the buildings had been clad in ACM of the same type as
Arconic’s Reynobond PE panels.27 Arconic had been reliably informed
that the ACM cladding could behave like a “chimney which transports
the fire from bottom to top or vice versa within the shortest time”. They
refused to withdraw the Reynobond PE panels from the marketplace,
even though a competitor, 3A, had withdrawn a similar Alucobond prod-
uct. At the time when Arconic was negotiating the Grenfell contract,
they sold two types of Reynobond cladding. The first was fire retardant,
known as Reynobond FR, and had a 70% mineral core. The other was
the Reynobond PE, which had a polyethylene core and was cheaper, but
combustible. Arconic’s profit margin was greater for the more commer-
cially popular Reynobond PE cladding. The evidence revealed that no
consideration was given to the fire safety consequences of continuing to
sell Reynobond PE.28
In 2014, the fire rating of Reynobond PE was downgraded from Eu-
roclass B standard, which recommended that it was safe to use on high-
rise buildings, to the much lower-class Euroclass E which meant that it
should not be installed on high-rise buildings. The downgrading was
effected after the polyethylene core had burnt ferociously in a fire test.