SYMPOSIA PAPER Published: 01 January 1982
STP33488S

Using Fire Tests for Quantitative Risk Analysis

Source

Fires can be considered a causal chain-of-events in which the growth and spread of fire may cause damage and injury if it is rapid enough to overcome the barriers placed in its way. Fire tests for fire resistance of the barriers can be used in a quantitative risk assessment. The fire growth and spread is modeled in a state transition model (STM). The fire barriers are presented as part of the fire protection model (FPM), which is based on a portion of the National Fire Prevention Association (NFPA) decision tree. An emergency equivalent network is introduced to couple the fire growth model (FGM) and the FPM so that the spread of fire beyond the room of origin can be computed. An example is presented in which a specific building floor plan is analyzed to obtain the shortest expected time for fire to spread between two points. To obtain the probability and time for each link in the network, data from the results of fire tests were used. These results were found to be lacking, and new standards giving better data are advocated.

Author Information

Ling, WCT
University of California, Berkeley, Calif.
Williamson, RB
University of California, Berkeley, Calif.
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Details
Developed by Committee: E05
Pages: 38–58
DOI: 10.1520/STP33488S
ISBN-EB: 978-0-8031-4827-7
ISBN-13: 978-0-8031-0724-3