FIRE SAFETY IN HERITAGE BUILDINGS

Cultural Heritage Disaster Preparedness and Response Patrimonio Cultural: Preparación y Reacción ante los Desastres Patrimoine culturel : prévention et gestion des catastrophes International Symposium Proceedings Salar Jung Museum Hyderabad, India 23-27 November 2003 ©ICOM, all rights reserved Link to the proceedings: http://icom.museum/disaster_preparedness_book/index.html

This paper is presented in CIPA 2009 at Kyoto, Japan (11-15 Oct 2009). ABSTRACT: In Malaysia, there are many heritage buildings with an architectural and historical significance that influenced by several architecture styles including a traditional Malay architecture, the Portuguese architecture, the Dutch architecture, and the architecture styles brought by British (e.g. Moorish, Tudor, Neo-Classical and Neo-Gothic). Most of them are worthy to be listed as Heritage Buildings or National Heritage Buildings under the National Heritage Act 2005 (Act 645). The Malaysian government is undertaking many efforts to promote conservation and preservation of heritage buildings in the country. Some of the buildings have been changed to different functions from its original (adaptive-reuse) such as into museums, libraries, offices or hotels. It is however, in the past few years there are few priceless heritage buildings were badly damaged or burnt down by fire includes the People Museum, Melaka (2...

Authors: N. Hamiruddin Salleh and A. Ghafar Ahmad Paper for The International Conference on Built Environment for Developing Countries, USM, Penang , Malaysia 3 rd -4 th December 2007. Note: Figures are not attached. ABSTRACT: In Malaysia , there are few heritage buildings with architectural and historical significance that may classified into several categories, namely traditional timber Malay houses, pre-world war shop-houses, colonial office buildings, institutional buildings and religious buildings. Some of them have been listed as Heritage Buildings or National Heritage buildings under the National Heritage Act 2005 (Act 645). However due to poor fire protection and management, many priceless heritage buildings were badly damaged or burnt down by fire e.g. Muzium Rakyat, Melaka (2001), Rumah Pak Ali, Gombak (2003) and Sarawak Club, Kuching (2006).It is widely accepted that fire is one of the greatest threats not only to the building’s occupants but al...