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Most fire-related injuries and fatalities in the UK, and other parts of the world, continue to occur during fires in the home – incidents where it is acknowledged that human factors play a contributing role. Yet the field of fire safety lacks an up-to-date review of the literature on human behaviour during fires in domestic spaces. Given there is now a growing body of work looking at human behaviour in dwelling fires, a review of the literature in this area is timely. Drawing from published studies, this paper sets out what is currently known about human behaviour in dwelling fires and highlights the differences that appear to exist between these spaces and what is known and accepted about human behaviour in public, commercial and industrial spaces. This paper then goes on to consider the nature of “fire risk”, arguing that much of the work in this area continues to conflate, or fails to recognise the existence of, different types of risk profiles, instead considering fire risk as a single type of risk, based mainly on factors related to fatalities. However, research findings point towards fire risk as at least three separate forms: the risk of a fire occurring, the risk of fire injury and the risk of fire fatality. By drawing together the literature on human behaviour in dwelling fires this paper argues that those who survive dwelling fires cannot be considered as “near miss fatalities”, but instead must be treated as a separate and distinct group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tunnels are key elements in modern traffic networks. Large-scale accidents and malicious threats, such as fires or explosions creating a blast loading, potentially carry very high economical and societal consequences. Compared to other statistically certain events, explosive-induced blasts in tunnels have an extremely low probability of occurrence but at the same time an enormous damage potential for structure, life, and environment. The paper presents a procedure for evaluation consequences of blast loading threat scenarios, focusing on the local and global structural integrity of tunnel constructions. Methods to capture the dynamic loading and the structural resistance, especially considering the dynamic soil response under large stresses and strains, are described. For that, a combined experimental and numerical approach is chosen, including characterization of the soil by dynamic triaxial experiments realizing stress levels of about 1 MPa, acting in 1 ms on the specimen. The analysis showed that the measured triaxial strength of the soil differed from the static by a factor of 2 for the friction angle. Furthermore, scaled experiments have been designed and conducted to demonstrate and investigate the behavior of a buried tunnel segment under blast loading. The results showed that realistic loading charges can cause massive cracking of the tunnel system and a soil sinking of up to 1 cm. Both experimental results obtained from the triaxial tests on the one hand and from the scaled tunnel experiments on the other hand have been validated using numerical models. The good agreement obtained is the essential input parameter for the evaluation of criticality in tunnels under blast loading scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the initial smoke detector was developed, research has been ongoing to reduce the response times to fire sources and improve the ability of detectors to ignore nuisance sources. Research has been conducted to analyze the signatures from cooking activities, ranging from normal cooking to the flaming ignition of food products with the intent of identifying the precursors to flaming ignition. In particular, the goal of the research is to provide an alarm sufficiently prior to flaming ignition to allow homeowners to take corrective actions to prevent a fire. For the 11 experiments analyzed, the optical density measured in the range hood was the most accurate precursor signal, having the greatest ability to predict the imminent transition to a flaming fire with a minimum of false positives. Though plagued by false positives, the temperature of the heating element and response of an ionization detector provided a faster response than the optical density measure. Given that this research only included 11 experiments, further research should be conducted on a broader range of cooking styles and items being cooked. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical ventilation velocity remains the most studied phenomenon in the tunnel fire literature. But focus on the velocity as the principal parameter may hide other features of the interaction between a fire and tunnel flow. The throttling effect was identified in the 1960s and described in the 1970s, yet it seems to be generally overlooked these days. In essence, the throttling effect is the tendency of a fire in a tunnel to resist the airflow; the larger the fire, the greater the resistance. Thus, while it has been shown that no increase in longitudinal flow velocity is required to control smoke from fires larger than the 'super critical' limit, in practice, an increasing number of ventilation devices are required to achieve this flow, and hence control the smoke from a fire, as the fire size grows. A CFD modelling study using the FDS model has been carried out to demonstrate this effect. It is clearly demonstrated that for fires larger than the 'super critical' limit, an increasing number of jet fans are required to control the smoke from increasingly larger fires. The results of the modelling study are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With regard to fire safety for exterior walls of a building, fire-resistance performance is considered, according to the current building standard law of Japan. And it was revealed that the fire safety is not specifically regulated from the viewpoint of reaction-to-fire performance, such as fire propagation caused by combustible materials or products which are installed on the exterior side of fire-resistant load-bearing walls. Actual fire issues in the world have shown that massive façade fire could occur at the exterior side of building wall even when the wall itself is fire-resistant. In previous studies of the authors, a test method of façade fire was tentatively proposed for evaluating the vertical fire propagation over an external wall within the same building. Furthermore, especially at the high-density residential areas in Japan, fire spreading would occur mostly from window to window between adjacent buildings, while walls are not burning by façade fire. But in case of combustible façades, such as insulating materials, combustible coating, or even sandwich panel are installed on the wall surface, once they are ignited, façade fire would occur and accelerate both the fire propagation in the same building and the fire spreading to the adjacent building. In this paper, results of fire tests on combustible façades are discussed from the viewpoints of both vertical fire spread along façades and fire spread between adjacent buildings assuming the densely populated residential area in Japan. The tentative criteria were determined based on the time to reach 500°C and duration time exceeding 500°C on façade surface for vertical fire spread along façade. As for intensively burned cases, at 2500 mm height from upper edge of the opening, specimens of exterior thermal insulation system with 200-mm thick expanded polystyrene (EPS), aluminum composite panel with polyethylene core and wooden façade without fire-retardant treatment continued exceeding 500°C for 3.1 min, 5.7 min, and 3.6 min, respectively, that were longer duration compared with specimens of resin painting (approximately 1 min). On the other hand, the another tentative criteria were determined for horizontal fire spread to an adjacent building based on the duration time exceeding the calibration test's peak incident heat flux on opposite surface 2000 mm from façade surface for horizontal fire spread to an adjacent building. At 500 mm height from upper edge of the opening, specimens of exterior thermal insulation system with high-density 100-mm thick EPS and wooden façade without fire-retardant treatment continued exceeding the peak incident heat flux of calibration test for 13.1 min and 13.6 min, respectively, while one specimen of resin painting and aluminum composite panel with polyethylene core continued for shorter duration of 4.2 min and 5.8 min, respectively, even though they showed relatively high peak façade surface temperatures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The NIST National Fire Research Laboratory (NFRL) is a unique facility used to conduct real scale fire measurements. In 2015, the NFRL was expanded to enable research on the response of real-scale structural systems to realistic fire and mechanical loading under controlled laboratory conditions. The scientific objectives of the expanded NFRL are to develop an experimental database on the performance of materials, components, connections, assemblies, and systems under fire load. This data can be used by the international research community to validate and verify physics-based predictive models. The lab features two high bay test areas, a 18 m × 27 m strong floor with 1218 anchor points, a 9 m × 18 m strong wall with 420 anchor points, a hydraulic loading system, four large exhaust hoods instrumented for fire calorimetry, an emission control system for scrubbing acid gases and particles generated by real fuels, controlled gas and liquid fuel burners, water suppression systems, overhead cranes and conditioning space. The laboratory expansion was designed to accommodate experiments on real-scale structural systems and components up to two stories in height and 2 bays × 3 bays in plan. Through application of controlled loads, true service conditions can be simulated, and structures can be exposed to controlled and realistic fire conditions that grow, spread and decay with heat release rates as large as 20 MW. Measurement capabilities have been developed to characterize the response of structural systems and components up to failure and to characterize the fire heat release rate and thermal environment in real time. A detailed description of the laboratory is presented with an emphasis on measurement capabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Timber panel construction using Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT) or Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL) panels have been developed for cost and construction efficiencies in the building industry. The increased use of timber as a sustainable construction material in buildings is expected to expand the forest industry and increase carbon stock. Heavy timber structural elements with sufficient load bearing capacity could be used in tall buildings. However, sufficient data are not yet available to understand the structural and thermal behaviors of domestic timber panel elements with cross laminations/layers when they are exposed to fire. In this study, fire testing data for timber panels are obtained and the charring characteristics and failure modes of structural elements under standard fire exposure are investigated to develop a simple method for estimating the fire resistance of timber panels. Toward this end, a series of experiments consisting of heating tests and load bearing tests for walls in furnaces with various experimental parameters was conducted. The experimental parameters considered include the adhesive type, thicknesses of laminations and panels, wood species, fire protection, and applied loads of the panels. Experiments without loading showed that CLT and LVL panels and joints of panels with 135 mm thickness showed sufficient thermal insulation and integrity over 90 min in standard fire tests. Smoke leakage from the joints of the timber panels was observed in the early stage of the fire tests because of a lack of air-tightness. Delamination of almost all charred layers glued with an API adhesive was observed in fire tests of CLT panels; however, delamination of LVL and CLT panels with a RPF adhesive was limited. The estimated charring rates of a Japanese cedar CLT panel with API and RPF adhesives were 0.78 mm/min and 0.66 mm/min at 260°C, respectively. The charring rate of LVL panels was ∼0.6 mm/min at 260°C, less than that of CLT panels. The load bearing capacity of timber walls subjected to one-sided fire exposure depended on the buckling strength under the eccentric load caused by asymmetric charring. A prediction method based on the Secant formula was presented to estimate the buckling strength in fire tests. An equation that considered the effect of the degradation of elasticity at high temperatures and eccentricity of loading provided the approximate buckling strength of the timber panel specimens in the fire tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fires that break out in tsunami inundation areas are collectively referred to as 'tsunami-induced fires' in contrast with 'seismic-induced fires' which have been conventionally a serious concern in Japan. Scenario of this new fire is basically as follows: (1) combustible objects such as houses are washed away by a tsunami, (2) combustible objects accumulate in tsunami inundation area as debris, (3) debris are ignited by some kind of cause, and (4) fires spread to adjacent debris resulting in conflagration in tsunami inundation area. We have been modeling tsunami-driven combustible objects as the first step towards development of tsunami-induced fire spread simulation. This modeling aims to know how combustible objects accumulate in tsunami inundation area to be the input data to fire models for ignition and fire spread. The proposed model is the extension of the existing model for driftwood by incorporating the debris release model and the effect of debris's collision with surviving buildings. This model collaborates with the existing numerical simulation of tsunamis and is able to predict the drift and accumulation behavior of individual debris by solving the equation of horizontal translational motion. In this paper, we conducted debris diffusion simulation for Yamada, Iwate prefecture, Japan for model's validation, where 16 ha of area were affected by tsunami-induced fire spread after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake Tsunami. The total number of debris tracked in the simulation was 1,850,560. A constant of proportionality, which determines the severity of force acting on drifting debris due to the collision with onshore surviving buildings, was identified by trial and error to maximize the eventual amount of accumulating debris within the fire-damaged zone. As a result, this maximum amount was predicted to be 4654 tons in the case that the constant is 0.1. Two thirds of the released debris, about 12,000 tons, accumulated onshore at the end of computation, and most of the fire-damaged zone was covered by these debris. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We studied the near-limiting behavior of various thicknesses of thermoplastic materials under a candle-like burning configuration; followed by an ISO 4589-2 protocol. The motivation for this work is to understand the sensitivity of the sample thickness on the limiting oxygen concentration in the range from 0.5 mm to 10 mm. In the first place, the effect of heating time on successive ignition was discussed. Through a simple analysis, it was suggested that a 30 s heating time, regulated in ISO 4589-2, might be insufficient to achieve a successful ignition when the specimen becomes thicker. Second, the effect of the thickness of the test specimen (PMMA, ABS) on the limiting oxygen concentration was examined. Flames formed over thicker PMMA (>4.0 mm thickness in this study) at near-limiting condition displayed a flickering motion, which then suddenly extinguished when the critical condition was achieved due to temporal acceleration of the surrounding flow. While the flame behavior with a thinner sample (<4.0 mm thickness in this study) at the limiting condition was found to be stationary, a gentle extinction was experienced as approached to the limit. This fact suggests that the key to leading extinction is different between thicker and thinner sample. Third, the temperature distribution over the 4.0 mm PMMA at the near-limiting condition was measured and a strategy to model/predict the limiting behavior is then proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An assessment of outcomes from research projects funded by the Joint Fire Science Program was conducted to determine whether or not science has been used to inform management and policy decisions and to explore factors that facilitate use of fire science. In a web survey and follow-up phone interviews, I asked boundary spanners and scientists about how findings from a random sample of 48 projects had been applied and factors that acted as barriers or facilitators to science application. In addition, I conducted an investigation of recent planning documents to determine whether products from the sampled projects were cited. All lines of evidence suggest that information from most (44 of 48) of these projects have been used by fire and fuels managers in some capacity. Science has mostly been used during planning efforts, to develop treatment prescriptions, and to evaluate current practices. Lack of manager awareness was commonly identified as a barrier to application of science. Conversely, activities and organisations that foster interaction between scientists and managers were identified as facilitating the application of science. The efforts of the Joint Fire Science Program to communicate science findings and engage managers has likely contributed to the application of fire science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective fire protection of steel can be fully realized when spray-applied fire resistive materials (SFRMs) are bonded sufficiently to structural steel during the event of a fire. The adhesion mechanisms and characterization at elevated temperatures, however, have remained elusive, owing to a shortage of quantitative experimental measurements of adhesion between SFRMs and structural steel. In complement with recent efforts aiming to measure the adhesion at ambient temperature, this contribution reports an experimental method based on a fracture mechanics approach to quantify temperature dependent adhesion behaviors of SFRMs adhered to steel substrates. Using this test method, it is shown that a sharp loss in adhesion occurs at temperatures well below 200 °C, and a less severe rate at higher temperatures. Thermogravimetric analysis and quasi-state uniaxial compression tests reveal that SFRMs undergo pronounced losses in mass and modulus upon elevated temperature exposures, respectively. Additionally, the dependence of the bulk properties on temperature correlates strongly with that of fracture energy. A mechanism based on mechanical softening and dehydration of SFRMs is proposed to explain the thermally induced adhesion loss. Furthermore, a comparison with the ASTM E736 was made by invoking a fracture mechanics theory. Calculation of bond strengths reveals temperature dependence analogous to the fracture energy data. Also, the residual bond strengths above 150 °C fall below the threshold value (i.e., ≥ 7.2 kPa or 150 lb/ft2) described in the ASTM E736. Importantly, the SFRMs are found to retain appreciable bond strengths greater than their own body masses, permitting them to remain intact in the event of a fire, in the absence of external perturbations. Published 2015. This article is a U.S. Government work and is in the public domain in the USA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expression 'heat flux' without any qualifier like 'to a surface at ambient temperature' as frequently used in fire safety science and engineering literature and standards is ambiguous and misleading. Boundary conditions in fire safety engineering problems cannot be expressed as a given heat flux (or net heat flux), as the heat flux depends on and varies with the exposed surface temperature and thereby the properties of the target body. Therefore, it is important that the terminology is reviewed and that an agreement is reached on how to express thermal exposure in a well-defined and unambiguous way. A proposal is given on how the boundary conditions can be defined in a consistent way that is applicable to fire resistance and reaction-to-fire problems. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given that photovoltaic (PV) power plant can cause and/or contribute to fires in buildings, the fire risk resulting from a PV power plant installation on a building roof or façade should be assessed in order to meet building fire-safety requirements. In fact, PV plant installed on a roof or a façade could fail and cause a fire and/or promote or facilitate its spread. Accident analyses have shown that PV systems are often installed without due consideration of fire propagation and fire spread caused by the presence of modules, cables and electrical boards on the roof. This paper shows a proposal for a method to evaluate the reaction-to-fire characteristics of a PV module and provides experimental results that compare the behaviours and performances of four kinds of PV module backsheet. Some of the commonest type of backsheet materials available on the market have been selected in order to evaluate and compare the reaction-to-fire performances of these products: Backsheet no.1 has three layers (PET/PET/Primer), Backsheet no.2 is composed of four layers (PET/Aluminium/PET/Primer), Backsheet no.3 is a Fluoro-Coating/PET/EVA three-layer sheet and Backsheet no. 4 comprises an outside coating, a PET layer and an inside Coating. Test results show that the choice of a single layer for Backsheet no.4 represents the best solution among the ones tested. Even though Backsheet no.2 shows the same reaction-to-fire rating as that of Backsheet no.4, the PV module production process could be critical as regards the electrical behaviour of the module itself, since aluminium foil is a material that conducts electricity. Moreover, since the fire-performance assessment of PV panels in Europe is left at a national level, the approach reported in this paper could represent a useful reference to be used as a baseline for developing a European standard or, better still, an International standard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In general it is recommended to fill a transformer pit with rock ballast to extinguish the fire if there is a leakage of burning transformer oil. There is a lack of technology-neutral performance requirements for the design of solutions for fire extinguishment in transformer pit fires. This hampers the introduction of alternatives to the traditional method of filling the pit with rocks. Therefore we have conducted quantitative tests where temperatures and concentrations of CO, CO, and O were measured at different position in a transformer pit subjected to burning oil simulating an accidental rupture and leakage. The tests were conducted to investigate the extinguishing capacity of one specific alternative solution, i.e. a profile plank layer over the pit. Three tests were performed with 90°C and 140°C pre-heated transformer oil. In the second test, a 19 cm water bed was used to examine the impact of rain water in the pit. The result showed that the profile plank extinguished the flames in a few seconds and that the water level did not have any significant effect on the result. The measurements showed that the temperatures peaked at 600-800°C 50 cm above the profile plank in all tests but dropped to under 100°C in 14-16 s. Furthermore the O-concentration dropped to 3-5 vol% below the plank, which contributed to the rapid extinction of the burning oil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper highlights key components of a fire model validation study conducted by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Electric Power Research Institute. These include the selection of fire phenomena of interest to nuclear power plant safety, the selection of appropriate models, the selection of relevant experimental data, and the selection of appropriate evaluation criteria. For each model and each quantity of interest, there are two metrics of accuracy. The first is a bias factor, which indicates the extent to which the model tends to over or under-predict the given quantity. The second is a relative standard deviation, which indicates the degree of scatter in the predicted quantity when compared with experimental measurements. While the study is motivated by nuclear power plant safety, the general procedure and results are appropriate for most industrial applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper considers what is meant by, and the purpose of, blind modelling in the context of fire engineering. A discussion is presented on the very important interaction between the model and the model users, and five generic groups of model users are defined. The paper goes on to provide details of previous blind modelling studies from the literature, as well as a recent blind modelling programme that was conducted in New Zealand. A so-called 'Openness Assessment Framework' is proposed as a way of scoring or ranking existing or planned blind modelling programmes, with the recent New Zealand programme forming the case study for the evaluation. This framework is then applied to a range of evaluation definitions that are given in the literature, the five generic model user groups, as well as the range of blind modelling exercises already identified. Finally, a seven-step methodology for designing blind modelling studies and experimental comparisons in the context of full-scale multi-item compartment fire experiments is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To date there is no International standard on the verification and validation (V&V) of building fire evacuation models, i.e., model testers adopt inconsistent procedures or tests designed for other model uses. For instance, the tests presented within the MSC/Circ.1238 Guidelines for evacuation analysis for new and existing passenger ships provided by the International Maritime Organization are often employed for the V&V of models outside their original context of use (building fires instead of maritime applications). This paper presents a list of verification tests for component testing and the analysis of emergent behaviours together with examples of experimental data-sets suitable for the analysis of different core components. The capabilities of building fire evacuation models are evaluated by studying their five main core components, namely (1) pre-evacuation time, (2) movement and navigation, (3) exit usage, (4) route availability and (5) flow constraints. This paper discusses the tests which are included in a freely available Technical Note developed at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. This work is intended to open a discussion on the main issues associated with the definition of a standard procedure for the V&V of building fire evacuation models, including the definition of the acceptance criteria of a standard V&V protocol. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mechanism of flame propagation in fuel beds of wildland fires is important to understand in order to quantify fire spread rates. Fires spread by radiative and convective heating and in some cases require direct flame contact to achieve ignition. The flame in an advancing fire is unsteady and turbulent, making study of intermittent flames in complex fuels difficult. A 1.83 m tall, 0.61 m wide vertical wall fire, in which ethylene fuel is slowly fed through a porous ceramic, is modeled to investigate unsteady turbulent flames in a controlled environment. Three fuel flow rates of 235, 390, and 470 L/min are considered. Simulations of this configuration are performed using a spatial formulation of the one-dimensional turbulence (ODT) model which is able to resolve individual flames (a key property of this model) and has been shown to provide turbulent statistics that compare well with experimental data for a number of flow configurations including wall fires. In the ODT model diffusion-reaction equations are solved along a notional line of sight perpendicular to the wall that is advanced vertically. Turbulent advection is modeled through stochastic domain mapping processes. A new Darrieus-Landau combustion instability model is incorporated in the ODT eddy selection process. The ODT model is shown to capture the evolution of the flame and describe the intermittent properties at the flame/air interface. Simulations include radiation and soot effects and are compared to experimental temperature measurements. Simulated mean temperatures differ from the experiments by an average of 63 K over all measurement points for the three fuel flow rates. Predicted root mean square temperature fluctuations capture the trends in the experimental data, but overestimate the raw experimental values by a factor of two. This difference is discussed using thermocouple response and heat transfer correction models. Simulated velocity, soot, and radiation properties are also reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Polymer foam encapsulants provide mechanical, electrical, and thermal isolation in engineered systems. It can be advantageous to surround objects of interest, such as electronics, with foams in a hermetically sealed container in order to protect them from hostile environments or from accidents such as fire. In fire environments, gas pressure from thermal decomposition of foams can cause mechanical failure of sealed systems. In this work, a detailed uncertainty quantification study of polymeric methylene diisocyanate (PMDI)-polyether-polyol based polyurethane foam is presented and compared to experimental results to assess the validity of a 3-D finite element model of the heat transfer and degradation processes. In this series of experiments, 320 kg/m PMDI foam in a 0.2 L sealed steel container is heated to 1,073 K at a rate of 150 K/min. The experiment ends when the can breaches due to the buildup of pressure. The temperature at key location is monitored as well as the internal pressure of the can. Both experimental uncertainty and computational uncertainty are examined and compared. The mean value method (MV) and Latin hypercube sampling (LHS) approach are used to propagate the uncertainty through the model. The results of the both the MV method and the LHS approach show that while the model generally can predict the temperature at given locations in the system, it is less successful at predicting the pressure response. Also, these two approaches for propagating uncertainty agree with each other, the importance of each input parameter on the simulation results is also investigated, showing that for the temperature response the conductivity of the steel container and the effective conductivity of the foam, are the most important parameters. For the pressure response, the activation energy, effective conductivity, and specific heat are most important. The comparison to experiments and the identification of the drivers of uncertainty allow for targeted development of the computational model and for definition of the experiments necessary to improve accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The implementation of US federal forest restoration programs on national forests is a complex process that requires balancing diverse socioecological goals with project economics. Despite both the large geographic scope and substantial investments in restoration projects, a quantitative decision support framework to locate optimal project areas and examine tradeoffs among alternative restoration strategies is lacking. We developed and demonstrated a new prioritization approach for restoration projects using optimization and the framework of production possibility frontiers. The study area was a 914,657 ha national forest in eastern Oregon, US that was identified as a national priority for restoration with the goal of increasing fire resiliency and sustaining ecosystem services. The results illustrated sharp tradeoffs among the various restoration goals due to weak spatial correlation of forest stressors and provisional ecosystem services. The sharpest tradeoffs were found in simulated projects that addressed either wildfire risk to the urban interface or wildfire hazard, highlighting the challenges associated with meeting both economic and fire protection goals. Understanding the nature of tradeoffs between restoration objectives and communicating them to forest stakeholders will allow forest managers to more effectively design and implement economically feasible restoration projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The determination of firefighting water requirements in large, tall and complex buildings in the UK has largely been based on data retrieved from studies into full-scale test fires, combined with some real fire research undertaken by the Fire Research Station (FRS) from 1955–1970. This scientific research effectively formed the basis for the design and configuration of rising fire mains (stand-pipes) in tall buildings, as well as water storage provisions for town centre and infrastructure planning. The resulting guidance is also applied to individually isolated buildings that are distanced from the nearest available water supply. However, it is suggested the UK has since fallen behind many international standards and codes, where firefighting water provisions are more reflective of modern building design as movable fire loads, compartment dimensions and window (ventilation) sizes have increased over the years. There have been recent calls in both the UK and USA for the development of a performance based method of calculating firefighting water requirements for design purposes, based on the quantity of water actually being used effectively by firefighters. The recent publication of BS PD 7974:5:2014 (7974) meets this need in calculating ‘adequate’ and effective firefighting water (s.8.5). The research by Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) provides a framework upon which the ‘7974’ water strategy evolved and is based on an analysis of 5401 building fires that occurred in the UK from 2009 to 2012, where active firefighting was undertaken across a broad range of occupancies. When used in design, any recommended deviations from the prescriptive codes may achieve some cost/benefit advantages, whilst at the same time providing an improved firefighting water flow density (L/min/m 2 ). It is also worth noting that UK prescriptive building codes do not differentiate between the volume of firefighting water storage required for residential or commercial buildings. Furthermore, reductions in compartment size and fire load, or enhancements to passive/active fire protection, may mean even less storage water is required when using the 7974 strategy compared to current code compliance. The GCU research clearly established that the severity of building fires is dependent on the size of compartment in which the fire originates; the containment of fire spread through the provisions of adequate passive or active fire protection; the fire load density and the potential for a fire to reach a fuel controlled burning regime at peak heat release for the compartment at Q max . It is further demonstrated that the quantity of firefighting water that may be deemed as ‘adequate’ can be presented on a gradient ( Fig. 13 ), ranging from the lesser amount (L/min) required in residential buildings (low-flow), upwards through offices or commercial mixed use buildings (mid-flow), to industrial and storage facilities (high-flow). This finding is not reflected in current codes. In using the ‘7974’ methodology to calculate adequate firefighting water, simple equations are utilised in this paper for both sprinkler protected and non-sprinklered occupancies. The method can be also be used where either dry or wet rising fire mains (standpipes) are required. In referring to past fire case histories it is then demonstrated that fires can travel across large floor plates, with great speed. A spread rate of >20 m 2 /min may see a fire develop with such velocity and power that any fire service intervention can become compromised from the outset, unless adequate firefighting water provisions are available and effective fire protection measures are in place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wildfire is a major threat to natural resources and native species in Hawai'i, but the frequency and extent of wildfires across the archipelago has not been well quantified. Our objective was to summarize the available wildfire data for Hawai'i and synthesize the social and ecological dimensions of wildfire drivers, impacts, and management responses. We constructed a 110-yr span of wildfire records for the state of Hawai'i to examine historical trends (1904-2011) and summarized relationships between contemporary wildfire occurrence (2005-2011) and land use/land cover types and human population. Total area burned statewide increased more than fourfold from 1904 to 1959 to peaks in the 1960s-1970s and mid-1990s to present. From 2005 to 2011, on average, 1,007 wildfires were reported across the state per year (±77 SE), burning an average of 8,427 ha yr-1 (±2,394 SE). Most fires (95%) were <4 ha, while most area burned (93%) was attributed to fires ≥40 ha. Ignition frequency was positively correlated with human population across islands. Wildfires were most frequent in developed areas, but most areas burned occurred in dry nonnative grasslands and shrublands that currently compose 24% of Hawai'i's total land cover. These grass-dominated landscapes allow wildfires to propagate rapidly from areas of high ignition frequencies into the forested margins of the state's watersheds, placing native habitat, watershed integrity, and human safety at risk. There is an urgent need to better assess fire risk and impacts at landscape scales and increase the integration of prefire planning and prevention into existing land management goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of a fire resistant coating for tunnel passive fire protection under successive severe thermal loading is presented. The material falls under the class of potassium based geopolymers (K-geopolymer) and was prepared by mixing ferronickel (FeNi) slag, doped with pure alumina, with a highly alkaline potassium hydroxide aqueous phase. Its performance was assessed by subjecting a concrete slab with a five cm thick K-geopolymer coating layer into successive RijksWaterStaat (RWS) fire incidents. During the first test, the maximum measured temperature in the K-geopolymer/concrete interface was 250 °C, which is 130 °C lower than the RWS test requirement, while, during the second fire test, the maximum temperature was almost 370 °C, which is still lower than the RWS requirement proving the effectiveness of the material as a thermal barrier. In addition, the material retained its structural integrity, during and after the two tests, without showing any mechanical or thermal damages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous studies have reported elevated concentrations of brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in dust from indoor micro-environments. Limited information is available, however, on the pathways via which BFRs in source materials transfer to indoor dust. The most likely hypothesized pathways are (a) volatilization from the source with subsequent partitioning to dust, (b) abrasion of the treated product, transferring microscopic fibers or particles to the dust (c) direct uptake to dust via contact between source and dust. This study reports the development and application of an in-house test chamber for investigating BFR volatilization from source materials and subsequent partitioning to dust. The performance of the chamber was evaluated against that of a commercially available chamber, and inherent issues with such chambers were investigated, such as loss due to sorption of BFRs to chamber surfaces (so-called sink effects). The partitioning of polybrominated diphenyl ethers to dust, post-volatilization from an artificial source was demonstrated, while analysis in the test chamber of a fabric curtain treated with the hexabromocyclododecane formulation, resulted in dust concentrations exceeding substantially those detected in the dust pre-experiment. These results provide the first experimental evidence of BFR volatilization followed by deposition to dust. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Periods of fire resistance are pervasive in the field of fire engineering. They are the basis of prescriptive structural fire guidance and also the end result of some quantitative analyses. Time equivalence methods are one such calculation approach that is used to define periods of fire resistance. However, these calculations often do not inherently consider the fundamental design challenges. These challenges are the fire safety goals and the constraints of the building and the physical world. The appropriate balance of these challenges is a solution. This paper further defines these concepts and gives examples of their application in the context of time equivalence analysis. It is found that the existing time equivalence methods do not adequately consider the challenges. An alternative framework, adopting a risk based approach, enables appropriate consideration of the goals and constraints to obtain a solution for structural fire resistance. This approach is sufficiently flexible that its component pieces can be improved and updated as new engineering techniques become available. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, numerous fires have started in Finland around roof penetrations of metal chimneys. One reason for the fires is the high flue gas temperatures of fireplaces. EN standards do not determine the flue gas temperatures of fireplaces meant for the specification of temperature classes of chimneys. At present, the design of chimneys is based on the temperature indicated in the CE marking of fireplaces. The temperature indicated in the CE marking is the mean temperature of the nominal test. In order to investigate how representative and safe this mean temperature is, tests on different fireplaces were conducted. Flue gas temperatures of the fireplaces were measured during a nominal test, a safety test and extra heating. Even in the nominal test, the highest flue gas temperature was 37°C to 212°C higher than the mean temperature. The highest flue gas temperature in the safety tests was about 120°C to 380°C higher than the mean temperature indicated in the CE marking. During the extra heating test, the highest flue gas temperature was 160°C to 350°C higher than that indicated in the CE marking. Due to the present method of determining flue gas temperatures, chimneys may be tested at a too low temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Firefighting robots are actively being researched to reduce firefighter injuries and deaths as well as increase their effectiveness on performing tasks. There has been difficulty in making firefighting robots autonomous because the commonly used sensors for autonomous robot navigation do not perform well in fire smoke-filled environments where low visibility and high temperature are present. In order to overcome these limitations, a multi-spectral vision system was developed that uses sensor fusion between stereo thermal infrared (IR) vision and frequency modulated-continuous wave (FMCW) radar to locate objects through zero visibility smoke in real-time. In this system, the stereo IR vision was used to obtain 3-D information about the scene while the radar provided more accurate distances of objects in the field of view. Through globally matching radar objects with those in the 3-D image, the accuracy of the stereo IR vision map was updated removing the far-field inaccuracy of the stereo IR as well as ghost objects created due to stereo mismatch. The system was sufficiently fast to provide real-time matching of objects in the scene allowing for dynamic reaction object tracking and locating. Through large-scale fire experiments with and without smoke in the field of view, the distance error for the stereo IR vision was reduced from 1% to 19.0% to 1% to 2% due to sensor fusion of the stereo IR with FMCW radar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire source distinction is useful in reducing the occurrence of false alarms and in choosing an effective fire extinguishing medium. This study was aimed at distinguishing fire sources through a smoke analysis. For this purpose, a smoke detection chamber was created, which was equipped with one light source and several light sensors for enabling simultaneous detection of light extinction and scattering, respectively. The test fires considered in this study had two kinds of sources: single fire source (paper, wood, and flammable liquid) and mixed fire source (paper-wood, paper-flammable liquid, and wood-flammable liquid mixtures). The amounts of extinction and scattering for each fire were measured experimentally, and the discrete probability distributions were calculated from the measured scattering amount. The optical characteristics of each fire were obtained using extinction data and the calculated probability distributions. These optical characteristics were then used for learning of neural networks, and the learned neural networks were used to distinguish fire sources from smoke generated in the case of both single fires and mixed fires. Results revealed that the neural networks could precisely distinguish fire sources on the basis of the smoke particles in the case of both single fires and mixed fires. The results of this study are expected to be useful in developing an advanced smoke detector that can distinguish fire sources in addition to detecting smoke. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In fire safety engineering, the concepts of design fire scenarios and design fires are important for several reasons. In the design phases of a construction project the performance of safety measures, and the potential consequences of a fire, must be assessed by exploring design fire scenarios and design fires. Active and passive fire safety measures are dimensioned by exposing the systems to predetermined fire events. A predetermined fire event can also be used to extract fire-related quantities, such as smoke production rates, temperatures, and heat fluxes. Therefore fire events, which form the basis of these analyses, must be established. In this paper we report results from our investigation of current approaches used to determine design fires and their associated input variables. We present a framework to categorize design fires based on various engineering principles, in which fuel properties and environmental factors are emphasized. The framework provides a more consistent methodology than seen elsewhere, taking the perspective of the practicing engineer into account. Furthermore the creation of design fires encompasses considerations of uncertainty and validity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effects of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) on flame spread over liquid fuels and its mechanisms are investigated in this work. MWNTs have shown a significant flame retarding behavior and are applied as flame retardant additives to increase fire safety. We measured the duration of flame spread over trays filled with diesel oil, kerosene or their mixtures with different concentrations of MWNTs. The results show the significant retardation of flame spread by addition of MWNTs. Comparing the results in copper and steel trays revealed that for 1 g/l of MWNTs, increasing the thermal conductivity of fuel is the dominant flame retarding mechanism, and retardation by disrupting the convective flows in the fuel is negligible. Nevertheless, for higher concentrations of nanotubes, disrupting the convective flows is also an important mechanism of flame spread retardation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire safety is an important issue of building safety, especially when the building’s fire load contents enhance the risks of fire deflagration. When existing timber structures are involved, the most usual way to improve its reaction to fire is to treat wood with fire retardants. This study focuses on the surface protection of existing timber roof structures against fire, through the use of fire retardant (FR) treatments applied on site. An experimental investigation was carried out to study the effect of FR treatments on timber reaction to fire, with a special emphasis on timber members with biological deterioration and previously treated with preservative products. The behaviour and effectiveness of intumescent and non-intumescent treatments was also investigated. The study showed that the application of FR treatments improved the reaction to fire of timber, even in the presence of previous preservative treatments. However, the choice of the specific FR treatment should take into account the substrate conditions. In addition, test results suggest that protection systems involving multi layers (intumescent and non-intumescent) with different functioning modes each are likely to have a good global performance on the protection of timber elements against fire. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

To study the fire protection effect of the nanocoating on the liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) tank under fire, the wavelet finite-element method is applied in analyzing the thermal stress, temperature, and pressures distribution laws of uncoated, coated, and nanocoated LPG tanks. First, the relating research on nanocoating and the wavelet finite-element method is studied, respectively, and the feasibility of this research is analyzed. Second, the theoretical model of fire protection analysis of nanocoating is established, and the property of wavelet analysis, temperature field model, and turbulent flow model are constructed, respectively. Finally, the simulation is carried out, and the distribution laws of thermal stress, temperature, and pressure are obtained. Simulation results show that the nanocoated LPG has better heat insulation character, and it can be used as a passive fireproof system that can cooperate with rain fire extinguishing systems to reduce the explosion hazard of a LPG tank under fire. The wavelet finite-element method has higher calculating efficiency and precision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire models are routinely used to evaluate life safety aspects of building design projects and are being used more often in fire and arson investigations as well as reconstructions of firefighter line-of-duty deaths and injuries. A fire within a compartment effectively leaves behind a record of fire activity and history (i.e., fire signatures). Fire and arson investigators can utilize these fire signatures in the determination of cause and origin during fire reconstruction exercises. Researchers conducting fire experiments can utilize this record of fire activity to better understand the underlying physics. In all of these applications, the heat release rate and location of a fire are important parameters that govern the evolution of thermal conditions within a fire compartment. These input parameters can be a large source of uncertainty in fire models, especially in scenarios in which experimental data or detailed information on fire behavior are not available. A methodology is sought to estimate the amount of certainty (or degree of belief) in the input parameters for hypothesized scenarios. To address this issue, an inversion framework was applied to scenarios that have relevance in fire scene reconstructions. Rather than using point estimates of input parameters, a statistical inversion framework based on the Bayesian inference approach was used to calculate probability distributions of input parameters. These probability distributions contain uncertainty information about the input parameters and can be propagated through fire models to obtain uncertainty information about predicted quantities of interest. The Bayesian inference approach was applied to various fire problems using different models: empirical correlations, zone models, and computational fluid dynamics fire models. Example applications include the estimation of steady-state fire sizes in a compartment and the location of a fire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses how the concepts of safety level and safety margin have been approached in recognized peer-reviewed journals within the field of fire safety science. The aim is to explore the scientific efforts that have been made to advocate principles for dimensioning fire safety arrangements in buildings. We restrict our discussion to novel buildings in the sense of lack of similar constructions with relevant long term experience. Due to increasing complexity in buildings, infrastructures, technical systems and society in general, we argue that traditional fire safety science based on natural science principles alone is severely limited. We argue that fire safety and safety margins are emergent properties of socio-technical systems that need to be managed rather than verified. The search for objectivity and mechanistic decision criteria is futile and diverts attention from the main purpose of engineering: to guide decisions during the whole design process and thus enable safe operation. An adapted framework for fire safety engineering is proposed, built around traditional fire safety engineering principles, and founded on constructivist systems theory. The focus is observable quantities and how these quantities can be managed during design and operation of a building project. The framework eases the involvement of stakeholders who are required to consider the safety aspects of the building design. The end goal of fire safety design in our framework is the development of a fire safety control structure that must be enforced to keep systems in a safe state, in which safety margins are deemed sufficient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For valuable assets and critical applications, fire suppression might not be enough. Damages caused by an incipient stage fire, secondary damages due to the activation of the fire suppression system itself or downtime of critical assets could cause unacceptable losses. In these cases, fire can be prevented by using hypoxic air (HA) rather than suppressed. HA technology for fire prevention, also known as oxygen reduction system, is based on a continuous reduction of the oxygen in the protected enclosure in order to limit the availability of oxygen to the combustion process: typically a small fraction of the oxygen in the air is replaced with nitrogen. The effect of low oxygen concentrations on the combustion process was investigated by a literature survey of existing pertinent sources. However, most of the tests found in the literature were not performed in a way which is adequately representative of the conditions created by HA systems. Because of this lack in the state of the art, it was therefore decided to develop an ad hoc ignition propensity test method able to assess different configurations. The performance of HA was then explored by carrying ignition propensity test on materials which can be found commonly in applications which lend themselves for HA technology. The tests were also carried out to study the performance of HA beyond the design parameters set by international standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The frequent incidents of fire attributable to systemic lack of compliance with fire safety standards in garment factories of Bangladesh has been a recurring problem taking away lives of many workers over the years. The manufacturers possessing significant economic and political clout have almost invariably escaped the sanctions of the national legal system. This paper argues that a trade restrictions regime imposed by a major importing country of garment products of Bangladesh may force the manufacturers to improve compliance with the relevant laws and engender the necessary change to provide workers with a safe working environment. It argues that such a trade restriction regime should neither be country nor even industry-wide, rather be targeted to rouge manufacturers acting in violation of safety laws. However, analysing the policy grounds and relevant WTO jurisprudence, this paper finds that despite the desirability of such a scheme, it would unlikely to be WTO-compliant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses research about the safety assessment of submarine missile systems during combat. Topics mentioned include the parameters of hazardous situations, accident in the weapon system, safety of submarine missile systems from fire and explosion, and the effect of contactless underwater weapon explosions on a submarine missile system.

Advances in CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) and significant increase of computational power of current computers have led to widespread use of CFD in aerodynamics, fluid dynamics, combustion engineering and other academic disciplines. One of such disciplines is computer modelling and simulation of fire in human structures. Fire is a very complicated and complex phenomenon. Fire research deals with such processes as combustion, radiation, heat transfer, turbulence, fluid dynamics, and other physical and chemical processes. Several advanced fire and smoke simulation systems have been developed to solve various aspects of fire safety in various conditions and environments. In this paper, the use of parallel version of the CFD simulator FDS (Fire Dynamics Simulator) for the simulation of fire spread and smoke development in a short road tunnel is described. In order to study the impact of the computational domain decomposition on the accuracy and reliability of simulation results, several simulations of a chosen fire scenario ran on the HP blade cluster utilizing different numbers of processors. The obtained parameters of fire and smoke were used to investigate the influence of the fire on people evacuation in the tunnel with active ventilation for a given traffic situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SUMMARY The development of fire-safety measures for high-speed passenger trains has been focused on preventing fire initiation or delaying fire growth and spread through small-scale tests of the materials used in trains. However, new fire-safety approaches for trains consider a systemic approach. This approach considers numerous global factors that influence fire dynamics, such as the influence of vehicle design, selection of materials, and active and passive protection systems installed. In the present paper, the results of small-scale and full-scale tests carried out on the new generation of high-speed trains operating in Spain are presented. This rolling stock is classified as category B according to the Technical Specification for Interoperability and Operation Category 3 according to EN 45545-1. The results confirmed good fire behaviour using both approaches (small and full-scale tests). Additionally, several analyses have been performed, including an analysis of the quality of materials used for making different components of the passenger compartment and the influence of ignition source position on fire development. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SUMMARY The effect of TiO2 and/or clay nanoparticles on water vapour permeability and the reaction to fire performance of coated and impregnated spruce wood were studied. Water vapour permeability properties were used to assess the moisture transfer properties and durability of the specimens using the cup test. The reaction to the early stage fire development properties of the specimens was analysed using a small scale cone calorimeter test. Comparisons between the different treated and untreated specimens on the moisture and reaction to fire performances were performed. The results revealed poor reaction to fire and water vapour resistance of specimens treated with TiO2 and/or clay nanoparticles containing treatments. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spray-applied fire-resistive material (SFRM) is one of the most commonly used fire protection materials for steel structures. The commonly observed delamination and detachment of SFRM, however, significantly reduces the overall effectiveness of fire protection. Engineered cementitious composites (ECCs) are a special family of high-performance, fiber-reinforced cementitious composites featuring very high ductility under tension, bending, and impact loads. This study investigates the feasibility of developing a new version of fire-resistive ECC that combines the fracture-resistant property of the ECC family of materials and the excellent insulation property of SFRM. The study shows that ECC with similar or even better insulation property compared with conventional SFRM can be developed, and the intrinsic high ductility of ECC improves the overall effectiveness and durability of fire protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new initiative, endorsed and supported by the International Association for Fire Safety Science (IAFSS, http://www.iafss.org ), has been launched: “the IAFSS Working Group on Measurement and Computation of Fire Phenomena” (or the MaCFP Working Group). The primary objective of this letter is to engage the members of the fire research community to participate in the first workshop organized by the MaCFP Working Group and which is scheduled as a pre-event to the 12th IAFSS Symposium in Lund, Sweden, in June 2017 ( http://www.iafss.org/save-the-date-12th-iafss-symposium/ ). Constantly updated information on the MaCFP Working Group effort is found at http://www.iafss.org/macfp/ . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]