Lenexa is taking steps to protect firefighters responding to house fires after several first responders were injured last year trying to bring a Shawnee house fire under control.
Earlier this month, the Lenexa City Council updated a series of home building codes that will require so-called under stair protection in new home construction.
Five Shawnee firefighters injured last summer
- In July 2022, a set of basement stairs collapsed while the Shawnee Fire Department and other local departments responded to a house fire in western Shawnee.
- Following a distress call on the scene, four Shawnee firefighters were rescued from the still-burning structure and taken to area hospitals. One additional firefighter was treated for heat-related injuries during the incident.
- The stairs’ collapse was subsequently investigated by the state Fire Marshal Office.
Extra layer will now be required under interior staircases
- Going forward in Lenexa, interior staircases will now be required to have a half-inch of sheetrock applied to their underside.
- It’s designed to slow the fire from reaching parts of the stairs that are integral to the structure, preventing collapse during a fire, Lenexa’s community development director Scott McCullough told the city council earlier this month.
- Such modifications can give stairs an extra 20 minutes of structural integrity during a fire emergency.
Other JoCo cities have adopted similar rules
- In November 2022, Shawnee adopted similar code changes.
- Leawood and Olathe have also followed suit.
- The Kansas City Home Builders Association did not object to Lenexa’s code change, according to city briefing documents.
There are a few exceptions
- Stairs outside the home, as well as stairs made from non-combustible materials are exempt from the requirements.
- Staircases with fewer than four steps or those with visible undersides would also be exempt.
- It will only apply to new construction.
Lenexa has made other recent code changes
- At the same time these fire safety codes were adopted, the city council also authorized revisions to the rules governing storm shelters.
- Lenexa banned the use of community storm shelters in new neighborhoods with single-family and duplex-style housing units.
- That change was prompted by a proposed development in growing western Lenexa called Stone Ridge North that would have exclusively used community storm shelters.
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