Spontaneous glass shattering suggests that "ordinary" glass has been used. It is NOT common for properly designed and specified toughened glass, used in structural walls , partitions or doors and correctly bedded in specialist rubber gaskets, to shatter, even when struck by a trolley or office chair. It sounds like poor specification on someone's part.

Can you clarify what sort of glass we are talking about here and/or how the panels actually failed; 'smashed' is not a helpful description.

Thanks for the replies. The glass is 12mm toughened glass, specifically designed for glass walls and doors, and complies with BS6262, dimensions of 3m tall by 1m wide. The independent reports did state that minor inclusions could be present, however the most likely cause is being struck on the edge of the panel by an external object (office chair or trolley). Some of the panels stayed in place so we could photograph them and after analysis is was relatively clear that the pattern of the shatter emanated from one single point, at exactly the same height as the arm rests from the meeting room chairs. "Smash" should be read as shatter into small pieces, as per the design characteristics of this sort of glass. We are confident that we know what caused these panel to shatter/smash, however I wasn't aware until recently that these panels could suffer some impact damage, usually on the edges, and then shatter at some later date, days or weeks later. We have included a weekly check of the glass panels (especially the edges) as part of the weekly building check. I'm reluctant to have "bumpers" around the panels to prevent inadvertent collisions with trolleys etc. We've also been advised that it's not wise to have window film placed on the glass as if one were to shatter then the whole panel could pose a greater risk of falling as one piece rather than in small particle sized pieces. I'm also confident that we are managing the risk to a reasonable level - I just wanted to check with others how they manage the risk, although I suspect it may be as "Chas" states, we tolerate the risk and simply manage the replacement and clean up operation....(thanks for the reference to the document - I'll search that this afternoon)