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Fire at Glasgow Central (08/03/26)

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Russel

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Network rail have uploaded a video taken of inside the station showing very little damage thankfully!




I can't see any visible damage.

What is really surprising is the lack of broken glass, given the ferocity of the blaze, I expected a lot of the roof glazing to be gone in the immediate area from the heat.
 
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Spsf3232

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I can't see any visible damage.

What is really surprising is the lack of broken glass, given the ferocity of the blaze, I expected a lot of the roof glazing to be gone in the immediate area from the heat.
There is a gap between the station and the building which I think in this case done it's job!

The next concern will be the remaining portion still standing and the adjoining wall of the hotel
 

Strathclyder

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The remaining facade is on the Union Street, not Central station, side, so less of a danger to the station when it does come down, in a controlled manner or not?
Yes of course. I was referring more to the safety of the general public, not it being a critical threat to the station/hotel if it gives up and collapses completely.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

Excellent news!

That's a great start at the very least.
A positive development indeed.

Who says they're not? There must be people working very hard designing and planning what to do, obtaining the necessary materials, lining up cranes and other plant. Trying to get stuck in before you've decided what to do can be a false economy - HS2 being the classic example.
Indeed. Pretty sure the relevent folk are working overtime to put together and enact a recovery plan once the fire is confirmed to out completely with no chance of any flare-ups occurring. I wouldn't want to be in their postions at the moment, that much I can say with certainty.
 
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QueensCurve

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Massive credit has to go to the fire service for saving the station. When I went to bed on Sunday evening it looked, to my untrained eye, that we'd be lucky to have Central still standing on Monday morning.
It would have been tragic to have lost it. It is my second favourite station after St Pancras. Sadly passengers hoping to grab a fish supper from the Blue Lagoon before boarding their train will be disappointed.
 

Strathclyder

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Massive credit has to go to the fire service for saving the station. When I went to bed on Sunday evening it looked, to my untrained eye, that we'd be lucky to have Central still standing on Monday morning.
Indeed, there was a palpable fear I had going to sleep on Sunday night that I'd wake up to the gutted ruins of Central on top of the loss of Forsyth House. Thanks to the heroic efforts of the fire service, my fears were fortunately unfounded. Fought like lions in very difficult circumstances. Deserving of all the praise heaped upon them imo.
 

mmh

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If you look at a Streetview of it the road is wider than the building is tall, so pulling it down towards the road, with suitable boarding on the buildings on the opposite side, should not be too onerous compared to e.g. taking down Grenfell Tower.
It isn't. Gordon Street isn't a wide road, it's actually a lot narrower than most through streets in that area. What's remaining of the won't be toppled down.
 

DelW

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It would have been tragic to have lost it. It is my second favourite station after St Pancras. Sadly passengers hoping to grab a fish supper from the Blue Lagoon before boarding their train will be disappointed.
Other branches are available :D and not too far away.
 

mmh

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The remaining facade is on the Union Street, not Central station, side, so less of a danger to the station when it does come down, in a controlled manner or not?
There is no "Central Station side", demolishing any building there will have a risk to the station.
 

Strathclyder

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A WCRC Thunderbird removed two 11 car Pendos and a TPE 397 to Polmadie overnight. All ScotRail units remain in the station
8 ScR units total as noted above. Not that it's really that important in the grand scheme, the unit numbers are as follows (listed in ascending platform order; info gleamed from RTT and the above Traksy screenshot posted by @Peter Mugridge):

  • 385032/385007 (last worked 2B89 from Lanark, sat at Platform 3 and thus are the closest remaining units to the site of the fire as of tonight)
  • 380115 (last worked 2N29 from Neilston; sat at Platform 6)
  • 380111 (last worked 2J09 from East Kilbride; sat at Platform 9)
  • 380101 (last worked 1G10 from Gourock; sat at Platform 10)
  • 380015 (last worked 2T40 from Largs; sat at Platform 12)
  • 380116 (last worked 1K68 from Ayr; sat at Platform 13)
  • 318262 (last worked 2D42 from Paisley Canal; sat at Platform 14)

I can imagine that ScR would very much like to retrieve them all and get them back into traffic, but obviously can't right now. Am sure there's enough slack in the EMU fleet given that normal level of service of course can't be run, but having 4 380/1s stuck there isn't exactly what I'd call ideal regardless.
 
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Chrius56000

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. . .There's one way of counteracting this that might make the whole rotten vape industry unviable as well :

. . .Introduce legislation banning vapes from being heated by anything but zinc–chloride/alkaline non–rechargeable cells – and refuse the importation of any with a charging port!

. . .Not only would this legislation do away with the uncontrolled storage of lithium batteries and their chargers, it might well make the stinking things unviable to buy and use – I have had surly teenagers and young people deliberately blow vape smoke at me and the smell is not gratifying!
 

norbitonflyer

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I can imagine that ScR would very much like to retrive them all and get them back into traffic, but obviously can't right now. Am sure there's enough slack in the EMU fleet given that normal level of service of course can't be run, but having 4 380/1s stuck there isn't exactly what I'd call ideal regardless.
I imagine they'd like them out of there anyway, just in case there is any prospect of part of the roof coming down or someone dropping scaffolding on them.
 

Chrius56000

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. . .If the very worst had happend and the station had been very badly damaged by the fire, would N.R. have simply flattened the whole area and designed a new Glasgow Central Station that occupied the floor space of the old station and the buildings round it, with the new building designed solely as a new replacement Glasgow Central Station?
 

pokemonsuper9

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. . .If the very worst had happend and the station had been very badly damaged by the fire, would N.R. have simply flattened the whole area and designed a new Glasgow Central Station that occupied the floor space of the old station and the buildings round it, with the new building designed solely as a new replacement Glasgow Central Station?
After years of political squabbling, presumably.
 

Buzby

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They don’t own the surrounding buildings, not even the hotel. (Or the Renfield Street frontages). Add to this, there is a massive underground labyrinth and space with the tracks suspended on brick pillars. It would take too long to start again - even if they reopened Bridge Street!
 

deerokus

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I suspect in that situation they'd demolish all of the buildings but try to keep the platforms, concourse etc and just put a big ugly cheap roof over it all as quickly as possible. The city being without the main terminus for 10+ years would be calamitous for the regional economy.

Central is going to need some sort of expansion in the future and there's no obviously easy way to do it which doesn't cause horrific disruption. This fire might have made that easier right enough, expand onto union street.
 

Ianigsy

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Scots property law is more open than English to people owning parts of a building outright, rather than taking a lease over a floor or a shop. There are probably a couple of dozen titles in that building which will need unpicking.
 

Steddenm

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. . .Introduce legislation banning vapes from being heated by anything but zinc–chloride/alkaline non–rechargeable cells – and refuse the importation of any with a charging port!
Since single use vapes were banned they have to have a charging port. The only other way round it would be to use AAA or AAAA batteries in them and replaced as when when needed.
 

D1537

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Since single use vapes were banned they have to have a charging port. The only other way round it would be to use AAA or AAAA batteries in them and replaced as when when needed.
Alkaline AAA batteries and the like cannot provide enough power for a vape. Ironically, using them could actually lead to overheating.
 

SC318250

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8 ScR units total as noted above. Not that it's really that important in the grand scheme, the unit numbers are as follows (listed in ascending platform order; info gleamed from RTT and the above Traksy screenshot posted by @Peter Mugridge):

  • 385032/385007 (last worked 2B89 from Lanark, sat at Platform 3 and thus are the closest remaining units to the site of the fire as of tonight)
  • 380115 (last worked 2N29 from Neilston; sat at Platform 6)
  • 380111 (last worked 2J09 from East Kilbride; sat at Platform 9)
  • 380101 (last worked 1G10 from Gourock; sat at Platform 10)
  • 380015 (last worked 2T40 from Largs; sat at Platform 12)
  • 380116 (last worked 1K68 from Ayr; sat at Platform 13)
  • 318262 (last worked 2D42 from Paisley Canal; sat at Platform 14)

I can imagine that ScR would very much like to retrive them all and get them back into traffic, but obviously can't right now. Am sure there's enough slack in the EMU fleet given that normal level of service of course can't be run, but having 4 380/1s stuck there isn't exactly what I'd call ideal regardless.
I suspect they will all need hauled out of Central, as I suspect the pans probably werent lowered before evacuation of the station, so the units will have flat batteries.
 

teaspoon

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I've mentioned the Cheapside Street fire of 1960. At that time, Glasgow Fire Brigade had a fireboat "St Mungo". It was used to feed water from the Clyde to 31 hoses for fighting the fire. It could draw 32 tons of water per minute from the river. Had it not been available it is possible that the public water supply would have been inadequate for fighting the fire.
The modern-day equivalent appears to be high-volume pumping units which are deployed on the riverbank and can move up to 3500 litres per minute.

They were used this week to get water from the Clyde - and I previously saw them used for (one of) the fires at the Art School, which is about 1km from the river and 50m up.

This page has some pictures from when they were first introduced, and lots of technical specifications:
The pump unit is a HydroSub 150 which contains a diesel hydraulic power pack with 60 metres of hydraulic hoses on reels. These two hoses connect to a submersible pump allowing the unit to be situated remotely from the pump horizontally or vertically and means you are not restricted to a 32’ lift with the appliance at the water’s edge. The pump is portable with two wheels and weighs 115 Kgs. It can pump 3,500 litres/minute at 10 bars or 2,500 litres/minute at 13 bars. The minimum depth of water needed is 0.3 metres. The New Dimension units are provided with an optional Hi-flow kit that allows them to pump 8,000 litres/minute at 2.5 bar. The power pack can also be used as a pump in a water relay by removing the strainer from the pump inlet and attaching the incoming hose in its place. Each hose box contains 1Km of 152mm (6”) hose giving a total of 3Km per HVPU.
 

sannox

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Sadly passengers hoping to grab a fish supper from the Blue Lagoon before boarding their train will be disappointed.
Well that's done people a favour then.

I hope they just pull it down quickly. Nothing worse than if they try to save it and it sits for years with ugly propping getting weatherbeaten and growing buddleia only to be pulled down years later.
 
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Prime586

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How flammable are the various products, chemicals etc used in such professions?
Highly flammable - aerosol hairspray, styling gels, hair dyes (which contain ammonia and peroxide) and the laquers and UV curable resins used in nail bars. Having all those businesses concentrated in one old Victorian building with no fire protection was just as much a risk as a vape shop.

The shop where the fire started was not strictly a vape shop either - it was a general 'tat' shop. It sold vapes, weed-smoking paraphenalia, airsoft guns and knockoff toys and plushies It was also full of cheap ebay/aliexpress/temu LED lighting and faux neon displays (that I'm sure were all properly CE marked and fused...).
 
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matchmaker

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The modern-day equivalent appears to be high-volume pumping units which are deployed on the riverbank and can move up to 3500 litres per minute.

They were used this week to get water from the Clyde - and I previously saw them used for (one of) the fires at the Art School, which is about 1km from the river and 50m up.

This page has some pictures from when they were first introduced, and lots of technical specifications:
The amount pumped by "St Mungo" was approximately 32,000 litres per minute, supplying 31 hoselines.
 

Steddenm

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Highly flammable - aerosol hairspray, styling gels, hair dyes (which contain ammonia and peroxide) and the laquers and UV curable resins used in nail bars. Having all those businesses concentrated in one old Victorian building with no fire protection was just as much a risk as a vape shop.

The shop where the fire started was not strictly a vape shop either - it was a general 'tat' shop. It sold vapes, weed-smoking paraphenalia, airsoft guns and knockoff toys and plushies It was also full of cheap ebay/aliexpress/temu LED lighting and faux neon displays (that I'm sure were all properly CE marked and fused...).
Most of the LED lighting and neon displays are powered by a 5v 1A USB cable, and doubtful have any electrical issues with them. I've got a few of them and never had any issues with overheating or any electrical interference at all. It is whatever type of USB plug they are using to power them that is the issue. A standard iPhone charger or USB-within-a-plug-socket works just as well.
 
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