Hochiki Europe is signed up by Cardiff City FC
Fire safety in the second-largest stadium in Wales, the 28 000-capacity Cardiff City Stadium, is provided by a Category L5 addressable fire-detection system using Hochiki equipment for a system designed and specified by Tiger Fire & Security. A Category L5 system is one in which the protected area(s) and/or location of detectors is designed to satisfy a specific fire-safety objective. The design is often based on a fire-risk assessment or forms part of a fire engineering solution.
This was the first football stadium that Tiger Fire & Security had worked on, but the company has since received a number of invitations from football clubs around the country for similar work.
The installation for Cardiff City Stadium is based around Hochiki’s Enhanced Systems Protocol as a total communications solution for intelligent fire protection and fully integrated systems. Its multi-purpose structure provides flexibility and expansion to accommodate simple addressable systems through to sophisticated integrated building-management and safety systems.
Hochiki multi-sensors and addressable beacons are used in the West Stand and general concourse area to reduce the likelihood of unwanted alarms. This stand has five levels with hospitality suite, player/changing areas, media room, club shop and suite for the chief executive. The fire-detection system was fully integrated with the PAVA system and operates in two modes, match day and other days, each specifically designed to maximise safety at different times.
The fire-detection system and PAVA system have a combined total of 20 km of cable and 350 Hochiki devices — including smoke detectors, loop base sounders and beacons, and input/output units. These components are linked to four networked panels around the stadium. The master control panel is in the match control room.
ALG-EN optical smoke detectors were also installed. Their chamber design minimises the difference in sensitivity experienced in flaming and smouldering fires. The result is a high-performance optical chamber that is equally responsive to all types of smoke and helps to reduce the possibility of false alarms.
