Gatwick Airport
About Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport is a major international airport near Crawley in West Sussex. As the second-busiest airport in the United Kingdom, Gatwick is the eighth-busiest airport in Europe.
It covers a total area of 674 hectares (1,670 acres) serving 46 million passengers in 2018.
Key Elements
- Fire Strategies
- Fire Risk Assessments
- Documentation Reviews
- Contracting Client: Gatwick Airport
- Location: Crawley, West Sussex
- Sector: Transport Hubs
The Challenge
Airports present a challenging environment for life safety – with several complex variables and conditions that affect every element of a fire strategy, from means of escape to prevention of fire spread.
Gatwick Airport is the UK’s second busiest airport catering for over 46,000,000 passengers. Ensuring that the existing structures and operation were compliant with part B of the Building Regulations was a challenge IFC were happy to tackle head on.
The Solution
With mass movement of passengers, large open foyer compartments, mixed use environments including; retail, hospitality, offices and public assembly spaces, the key areas of life safety revolve around effective evacuation, and resilient compartmentation to resist the spread of fire.
Using engineering principles tailored towards achieving compliance with Part B of the Buildings Regulations, a comprehensive new fire strategy was produced with recommendations for each of the major sites primarily focussed upon fire separation.
The client required assurances of the effectiveness of fire separation and this was achieved by making engineering assessments using regulatory guidance. Further services included detailed fire risk management plans and reviews of passive fire protection installations.
The Outcome
The client was given the assurances they required for the safe operation and planned expansion of the site, with a number of bespoke reports detailing both recommendations and areas of compliance with the Regulatory Reform (Fire) Safety Order and Building Regulations.
The reports were produced in a time-effective manner minimising costs to the client with recommendations made to avoid overprovision of unnecessary products and systems.
