On 26th November, 14 people, including one carer, were killed in a fire in a charity workshop for people with disabilities. The fire alarm was raised at 14:00 in the Caritas Association workshop in Titisee-Neustadt, near Freiburg in the south of Germany. According to reports, the fire began when gas from a leaking propane canister caught fire. The initial police report spoke of an explosion which instantly killed all the victims. However, the photographs showed no obvious major damage to the building and later reports claimed that all the victims died of smoke inhalation from the fire. Eugen Brysch of the German Hospice Trust appeared on national television to call for sprinklers in this sort of building. This produced a furious response from some people but if the victims died of smoke inhalation from a fire it is very likely that a sprinkler system could have saved some or all of them. We hope that the authorities will look into this. Meanwhile, another workshop for the same charity had already been fitted with sprinklers.