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The Zibibbo Restaurant fire Saturday afternoon was caused by a cooking fire that got out of hand and flared into a hood and duct, according to a preliminary investigation by Palo Alto fire officials.
But fire investigators want to know why a fire-suppression system that was recently inspected failed to activate to quell the flames, according to Barbara Cimino, emergency coordinator for the Palo Alto Fire Department.
“The cooking staff also attempted to manually activate the system but were unsuccessful,” she reported.
Zibibbo’s is exploring ways to open a portion of the business during repairs but it could be a month before the restaurant is back in full operation, Cimino reported.
The fire, initially reported shortly before 2 p.m. Saturday, drew numerous fire trucks, including a crew from Menlo Park Fire Protection District, and closed streets in the area of Lytton Avenue and side streets Florence and Kipling avenues. Zibibbo is at 430 Kipling but extends through to Florence.
Cimino said that while the fire started as the cooking staff prepared a dish the heat apparently melted a fused link that activated the fire-extinguishing system, causing the system to fail and the fire to spread “up the entire exhaust ducting system.”
She said insurance and fire protection company representatives “will be conducting an engineering analysis to determine the reasons for the failure of the system to automatically function and operate as expected.
“Maintenance records indicate that the automatic fire extinguishing system and duct piping were recently serviced within the required time frames,” Cimino reported.
I worked there for a number of years. There were THREE fires during my tenure. One was a mystery fire in the linen closet. The second was a grease fire caused by poor training and supervision. The third was caused by faulty construction. At the grill station nails had been driven through the back wall into the studs. The nails acted as a heat conductor. The nails were hot enough to cause a fire inside the walls. Are these three fires plus the most recent one enough to prompt some scrutiny from PAFD? I hope we can prevent loss of life.
If an expert in fire suppression systems is needed for the analysis, please go to http://www.firedyne.com for info.
As someone frequently involved in commercial kitchen design, I will follow this with interest. Because of Frisco’s susceptibility to fires, this area has been in the lead developing kitchen fire controls and in enforcement of those requirements.
I hate to say it but we need more of these fire to wake up the fire inspectors and licensing organizations. There are a lot of these situation in our restaurants just waiting to happen and no one wants to be pro-active until someone is killed.
Not so here, joebob. In half a century association with local construction, I have never had a fire inspector do anything less that a thorough job of review or inspection. I cannot say that for some of the other administrative divisions.
Ate there last month for lunch and it was completely dead! Plus our waiter who couldn’t have had more that 3 tables was not attentive at all and disappeared with our credit card for 15 minutes! We had to walk around to ask someone to find him. I wouldn’t be surprised if they want to close with some insurance $ in the bank.
And Walter, Please don’t call it Frisco!
One of my grandsons was born there, so I’ll make you the same deal I made with another Fransciscite; I will call it San Francisco only until you next call it “The City”.
I do miss my notes from Herb, typed out on his 3×5 note paper. Herb and I had a few commonalities, our rearing in Sacatomatoes and our our service in the 184th Infantry. Whatever happened to the mag Herb’s son Christopher was putting together?
I am presently an independent fire inspector and have been doing fire inspections at many restaurants for the last 10 years in the San Francisco Bay Area. I would like to know what type of fire extinguishing system was installed protecting the cooking areas (wet or dry) brand, etc. probably a wet system. The maintenance/servicing records should be throughly reviewed for the past 5 years. Was the fusible link replaced during the last servicing of the system? If so was the correct fusible link installed? There are a lot of factures to consider before coming to any positive conclusion on why the extinguishing system did not activate.
Those who work with flammable metals, chemicals or in chemistry laboratory, a bucket of soil, water or water-filled extinguishers are not acceptable for use. Because, it is not sufficient to handle fires involve flammable or combustible liquids such as gasoline, kerosene, and common organic solvents; energized electrical equipment, such as appliances, switches, panel boxes and combustible metals, such as magnesium, titanium.