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Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

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Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#21

Post by mystified5016 »

WalterBright wrote: post #17
bugglebeetle wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Getty has an endowment in the billions and an entire team devoted to this that is permitted to be on site, coordinates with local fire and police services, etc. The entire center is also built into the hillside, with fireproof vaults in the underground levels, so there is no real risk to any of the collections.

If people evacuate before putting the art in the vaults, the vaults won't work. Remember the Titanic when the life boats left half full?

"Yeah and what if you just forget to use your fancy equipment? Not so smart now, huh?!"

You totally showed them

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#22

Post by DidYaWipe »

mycentstoo wrote: post #3

Additional Context: The Getty Villa which is on the border of Malibu and Pacific Palisades was the structure that was threatened by fire directly. This article is about the Getty Center which lies in Brentwood and fires did not reach it. Center: 1200 Getty Center Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90049 Villa: 17985 Pacific Coast Highway, Pacific Palisades, CA 90272

Yep. The Getty Villa was threatened, and is not discussed in the linked article.

I enjoy the villa at least as much as the main center. It would be a huge loss.

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#24

Post by moralestapia »

mystified5016 wrote: post #21
WalterBright wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people evacuate before putting the art in the vaults, the vaults won't work. Remember the Titanic when the life boats left half full?

"Yeah and what if you just forget to use your fancy equipment? Not so smart now, huh?!" You totally showed them

An observation on how this has become extremely common nowadays.

Here, at work, in real life. People just argue with whatever dumb thing they can come up with, for the sake of arguing, it makes them feel smart. It's really hard to have a meaningful conversation with them.

I go to a couple philosophical discussion groups and the occasional town hall meeting. People just can't get their imaginary needs satisfied.

"But that area seems unsafe"

"We could hire a security guard to be around"

"But what if the security guard is a criminal, like in that one episode of muh favorite tv show"

"We could do an extensive background check, work with companies that have a good reputation, ..."

"But what if they make all that up, I saw that in a movie"

And nothing. ever. gets. done.

Btw, I've even seen people get a small round of applause by their peers after making one of such arguments irl. This comes to mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn200lvmTZc.

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#25

Post by Spooky23 »

__turbobrew__ wrote: post #4

I guess it is too expensive to have a fm-200 based fire suppression system? They say they have sprinklers as a last resort but I’m guessing it would destroy most of the art if you needed to use them.

That’s not really for this sort of threat. Those systems displace oxygen in a confined space and into the are intended to stop combustion originating in that space.

They may have a system like that in a vault but not for the whole facility.

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#26

Post by cge »

__turbobrew__ wrote: post #4

I guess it is too expensive to have a fm-200 based fire suppression system? They say they have sprinklers as a last resort but I’m guessing it would destroy most of the art if you needed to use them.

In addition to other comments: there are also specialized sprinklers to minimize both the risk of inadvertent damage (they point out their sprinkler systems are dry by default, which is not typical), and to minimize damage on correct activation: eg, typical sprinklers turn on permanently, often by a vial breaking, but if I recall specialized museum/library sprinklers exist that can turn on and off depending on conditions.

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#27

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #20
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's also relevant because the Getty Center has been rather smug about how awesome their fire protection is. I think your "smug" comment is unwarranted. They put a ton of solid engineering thought, money and planning into protecting the center from fire. Nothing is 100% but I think their confidence is warranted. Related, the Getty Villa right in the middle of the Palisades also put a lot of thought, planning and mo…

They are being really smug, talking about designs and systems that mean nothing when you've got temperatures outside the building hot enough to melt aluminum engine blocks, infrared radiation intense enough to set fire to things hundreds of feet away - as well as very low oxygen and very high CO/CO2 levels along with dozens of different toxic gasses - all of which HEPA filtration won't do squat about. A "stone facade…

Yes, wildfires get incredibly hot. But the fires essentially always travel by embers or direct contact with fire - your comments about IR radiation seem to imply that IR alone will cause ignition, which is rarely if ever the case.

Here is a story about a bunch of people who survived the Camp fire in Paradise, CA, surrounded by the raging inferno, by staying in the middle of a parking lot: https://www.firehouse.com/operations-training/wildland/news/...

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#28

Post by cge »

bugglebeetle wrote: post #19
WalterBright wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people evacuate before putting the art in the vaults, the vaults won't work. Remember the Titanic when the life boats left half full?

> The Getty has […] an entire team devoted to this that is permitted to be on site.

Yes: you can notice this, for example, in the announcements they put out while the area around the Getty Villa evacuated and then burned, where they pointed out that non-emergency staff had evacuated. Similarly, I think JPL always had (emergency) staff present, and their own firefighting resources.

Having heard about wildfire policies for some high-profile institutions in fire-prone areas, they'll often have their own procedures, in coordination with local authorities, which may not involve evacuating when others do, and may involve people coming to the site when others are evacuating.

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#29

Post by hyeonwho4 »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #20
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's also relevant because the Getty Center has been rather smug about how awesome their fire protection is. I think your "smug" comment is unwarranted. They put a ton of solid engineering thought, money and planning into protecting the center from fire. Nothing is 100% but I think their confidence is warranted. Related, the Getty Villa right in the middle of the Palisades also put a lot of thought, planning and mo…

They are being really smug, talking about designs and systems that mean nothing when you've got temperatures outside the building hot enough to melt aluminum engine blocks, infrared radiation intense enough to set fire to things hundreds of feet away - as well as very low oxygen and very high CO/CO2 levels along with dozens of different toxic gasses - all of which HEPA filtration won't do squat about. A "stone facade…

Stone doesn't burn, and neither does concrete. Glass melts. Steel evidently didn't burn at the temperatures these fires got to. So it makes sense that a building made of concrete and steel with stone facades and fiberglass insulation would survive the fire, especially after clearing out and hydrating the surrounding landscape so it wouldn't have the density or flammability of a forest. The Getty Center may have gotten lucky, but they might have also earned their "luck" through investment and planning.

Re: Why the Getty Center Is the Safest Place for Art During a Fire (2019)

#30

Post by DiscourseFan »

cge wrote: post #28
bugglebeetle wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Getty has […] an entire team devoted to this that is permitted to be on site.

Yes: you can notice this, for example, in the announcements they put out while the area around the Getty Villa evacuated and then burned, where they pointed out that non-emergency staff had evacuated. Similarly, I think JPL always had (emergency) staff present, and their own firefighting resources. Having heard about wildfire policies for some high-profile institutions in fire-prone areas, they'll often have their ow…

I imagine they have a number of life-support systems to ensure the staff can hang out in the building for a while in case of a severe natural disaster.
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