Compartment Fire-Generated Environment and Smoke Filling.

Published

January 1, 1995

Author(s)

Leonard Y. Cooper

Abstract

The following generic problem must be solved if one is to be able to establish the fire safety of building designs: [*] Given: Initiation of a fire in a compartment or enclosed space, [*] Predict: The environment that developes at likely locations of occupancy, at likely locations of fire/smoke sensor hardware (e.g., detectors and sprinkler links), and in locations of safe refuge and along likely egress paths, [*] Compute: The time of fire/smoke sensor hardware response and the time of onset of conditions untenable to life and/or property. This computation would be carried out from the above predictions, using known response characteristics of people, hardware, and materials. The above is only a simple sketch of the overall problem that is likely to be associated with the interesting details of many real fire scenarios. A long-term challenge of fire science and technology is to solve the above type of problem, even when it is formulated in elaborate detail. Compartment fire modeling is the branch of fire science and technology which develops the necessary tools to address this generic problem. This chapter will describe some of the key phenomena that occur in compartment fires, and it will focus on smoke filling which is one of the simplest quantitative global descriptions of these phenomena. A specific smoke-filling model will be presented, and solutions to its model equations will be discussed along with example applications.

Citation

SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering

Publisher Info

, -1

Pub Type

Book Chapters

Download Paper

Local Download

Keywords

fire protection, fire protection engineering, compartment fires, smoke, fire safety, building design, egress, equations, smoke spread, scenarios, mathematical models, temperature, time, thickness, combustion products, detection time, ignition, smoke filling

Citation

Cooper, L. (1995), Compartment Fire-Generated Environment and Smoke Filling., SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering, , -1, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=916979 (Accessed April 24, 2024)