Saturday evening, fire fighters entered a 50th floor Trump Tower residence that was ablaze. The unit had no sprinkler system, allowing the fire to spread quickly. Sprinkler systems are now required by code in NYC but buildings built prior to 1999 which have not undergone major renovations are not required to be retrofitted with sprinklers because Trump successfully lobbied to have existing buildings exempted from the code.
Trump has called a dozen council members to lobby against sprinklers, including Speaker Peter Vallone. He has also donated $5,000 to retire Vallone’s campaign debt, and personally telephoned committee chairman Archie Spigner, and Walter McCaffery, the sponsor of the bill.
Trump says he can’t afford to install sprinklers in all his building
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“I would inform Trump there must be sprinklers in every apartment and hallway,” Rose responded.
“I would tell him if there has been a sprinkler in the Culkin apartment, the fire would have been out in 30 seconds, and nobody would have died. I will gladly pay a small rent increase to have sprinklers.”
Trump Aggressively Fought Sprinkler System Law That Could Have Saved Man in Trump Tower Fire
Sprinkler systems are relatively inexpensive, but Trump was too cheap to install them in his buildings which has endangered first responders and likely cost a man his life.
To Trump, regulation is a pain. Human lives are cheaper than the cost of sprinklers.
Trump Tower resident, Todd Brassner, who Trump had allegedly called “a crazy Jew” was found alive but unconscious and died from smoke inhalation shortly after being taken to Mt. Sinai hospital. Since Trump’s election, Brassner had been trying to sell his apartment but could not find a buyer.
Four firefighters were injured battling the blaze. Trump Tower residents were terrified and reported they received no notice from management when the fire broke out:
We were smelling the smoke, and it was really scary, and we had to leave the store,” one witness told CBS2’s Lisa Rozner.
“I saw like a load of debris smashing windows, and then that’s when they were like you’ve got to get out,” said witness Will Hammonds.
“Then all of a sudden, as we were going up the escalator, there was this massive noise,” a woman added.
Fire alarms were not triggered in the building. There was no evacuation plan and there was no working smoke alarm in Brassner’s apartment.
No Working Smoke Alarm Found in Trump Tower Inferno Apartment: FDNY Official
NYC Fire Marshalls report the inferno appears to be caused by an electrical malfunction.
This is the second fire caused by an electrical malfunction in the “well built” Trump Tower in the past three months.
Two people were injured in the fire, which officials said may have been caused by electrical heaters inside the cooling tower.
Jerome Rose, who in 1999, directly called on Trump to support having sprinklers installed in all residential NYC high rise buildings had this to say about the recent inferno at Trump Tower:
It's criminal ... that people who live in these high-rise buildings without sprinklers do not have any protection," Rose told ABC News on Sunday.
Trump has made no mention of Todd Brassner, the man who died in a fire in his building.
Although Trump successfully fought the code requiring sprinklers be installed in all residential high rises in NYC, that may be changing after the recent deadly blaze at Trump Tower, a building owned and operated by the Trump Organization:
Law Requiring Fire Sprinklers in NYC High-Rises May Return—Against Trump’s Wishes
A New York City lawmaker is looking to mandate that residential buildings—including Trump Tower—adopt fire sprinkler systems after one civilian was killed and six firefighters were injured in a fire at Trump’s Fifth Avenue headquarters over the weekend.
Brooklyn Councilman Robert Cornegy, chairman of the Council’s Committee on Housing and Buildings, put in a request on Monday to draft legislation that would require buildings like Trump Tower, as well as residential buildings with four units or above, to be retrofitted with sprinklers.
Cornegy insists that the sprinkler requirement is a “tool in a toolbox” that can ultimately result in the safety of “hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers.”
“We would like to think that at the very least, it provides an extra cushion of time to seek safety—if not putting out a fire in due time,” he said at a press conference announcing the legislation at City Hall on Monday afternoon.
In 1999, now-President Donald Trump, a developer, fought against a bill that required residential complexes to have sprinklers, Cornegy noted.