S 1.47 Separate fire cut

Initiation responsibility: Management

Implementation responsibility: Architect

The definition of fire cuts is extremely important for the fire protection of a computer centre. The effectiveness of reliable fire and smoke zones has been impressively demonstrated in many major fires.

The requirements placed on firewalls and on the size of fire cuts in computer centres should go beyond the requirements contained in the relevant standards, such as the state building regulations or DIN 4102.

The firewall or fire cut should be aimed not only at protecting individuals and buildings but also at protecting the assets of the organisation and their availability. Thus the aim should be not only to prevent the fire from spreading through the flame effect and hot fumes, but also to prevent heat radiation and the spread of cold fumes.

The heat radiation that is still allowed under DIN 4102 is actually high enough to have a destructive effect on fixtures and fittings, especially in the heat-sensitive IT area. For these reasons several fire and smoke protection zones should be implemented in the building project. These should be as large as necessary and as small as possible.

For a computer centre it is necessary to check to what extent additional internal fire cuts need to be created. If a separate fire cut is necessary for the core units (IT rooms, data media archive), then walls, doors and also any necessary wall and ceiling breaches must satisfy the F90 requirements.

If the fire cut for the computer centre contains any office units, for example, then F30 and T30 doors between these offices and the computer centre core area within the fire cut will be sufficient. The offices must then be included in the fire alarm system.

Steps must be taken during planning and in operation to ensure that there are no special fire loads in any of the rooms inside the computer centre fire cut.

Additional controls:

• Are the premises divided into appropriate fire cuts?