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Kristen Greene, Shanee T. Dawkins, Sandra S. Prettyman, Pamela J. Konkol, Mary F. Theofanos, Kevin C. Mangold, Susanne M. Furman, Michelle P. Steves
With the newly created Nationwide Public Safety Broadband Network (NPSBN), the public safety community is in the process of supplementing the use of land mobile radios (LMR) to a technology ecosystem that will include a variety of new communication tools
David T. Butry, David H. Webb, Stanley W. Gilbert, Jennifer Taylor
This report identifies, summarizes, and evaluates the available data and the literature describing the economic costs associated with non-fatal firefighter injuries, illnesses, health exposures, and occupational disease (health outcomes) resulting from
This paper presents a learning-by-synthesis approach to facilitate the utilization of machine learning paradigm to enhance situational awareness for fire-fighting in buildings. An automated Fire Data Generator (FD-Gen) is developed. The overview of FD-Gen
Richard Kesler, Constandinos Mitsingas, Adam G. Quiat, Tonghun Lee, Daniel Madrzykowski, Gavin Horn
In todays structure fires, evolving fire loads and higher heat release rates mean that fires grow larger and faster than ever before. Firefighting personal protective equipment (PPE) can be subjected to these severe thermal conditions repeatedly during
The FireCARES project is a web-based tool intended to help fire departments effectively match resources to community risk. Among other things that includes estimates of the community risk and estimates of effectiveness of response. This report documents
Nine full-scale fire experiments were conducted in two residential-scale structures to study how different fire fighting tactics, specifically horizontal, vertical, and positive pressure ventilation, affect the fire environment within a structure. The fire
Craig G. Weinschenk, Daniel M. Madrzykowski, Keith Stakes, Joseph M. Willi
Experiments were conducted to investigate the capabilities and limitations of compressed air foam (CAF) relative to water when used for interior structural fire fighting. The key outcomes were to measure the gas cooling and fire suppression capabilities of
The present study investigates the characteristics of obscuring media inside an optical smoke cell, which is developed as a bench-scale testing facility for the evaluation of thermal imagers used by fire fighters. The smoke obscuration conditions through
Joseph M. Willi, Daniel M. Madrzykowski, Craig G. Weinschenk
Fire suppression tactics using hose streams can affect ventilation in a structure and may impact the movement of smoke and heat through a structure. Seven series of experiments were conducted to study the impact of different hose stream and nozzle movement
An experimental apparatus designed to study firefighter turnout gears exposed to a thermal environment was developed. The apparatus consisted of an elevated temperature flow loop with the ability to heat the air stream up to 200 ºC. The thermal and flow
Craig G. Weinschenk, Kristopher Overholt, Daniel M. Madrzykowski
Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS), which is a fire model that is developed and maintained by the Na- tional Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), was used to provide insight into the dynamics of a fire that occurred on February 24, 2012, within a
Primary focus of this paper is to review existing test methods that quantify steam burn injuries and to compare bench-scale test methods that use pre-wetted samples as opposed to external steam exposures to evaluate heat and moisture transfer in protective
The purpose of this paper is to make a study of the degradation of polycarbonate lenses when submitted to thermal radiations between 5 and 15kW/m2. In addition, it studies how to improve the lenses' thermal resistance by adding a thin reflexive reflective
Kristopher J. Overholt, Craig G. Weinschenk, Daniel M. Madrzykowski
Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS), which is a fire model that is developed and maintained by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), was used to provide insight into the dynamics of a fire that occurred on June 2, 2011, within a multi-level
Craig G. Weinschenk, Daniel M. Madrzykowski, Kristopher J. Overholt
The Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) fire model, which is developed and maintained by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), was used to provide insight into the dynamics of a fire that occurred on November 2, 2012, within a 2 1⁄2 story
Michelle K. Donnelly, William F. Young, Dennis G. Camell
This study investigates the performance issues associated with the use of handheld portable radios by fire fighters working in elevated temperature environments. Radios may be vulnerable to elevated temperatures that can be encountered during fire fighting
Fire dynamics can provide a firefighter with means to understand how a fire will grow and spread within a structure and how best to control that growth. Researchers have generated experimental results and computer models to explain how fire dynamics
Michelle K. Donnelly, Daniel M. Madrzykowski, Anthony D. Putorti Jr.
This exploratory set of experiments investigated the impact of external exposure temperatures on Self Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA) supply air, and the potential for the supply air to be heated when it is subjected to an elevated temperature
Limited information exists on what respiratory threats are present in the fire overhaul environment. Hand-held direct-reading particulate detectors have long been used to monitor respiratory threats for industrial hygiene applications. Therefore, it may be
Jason D. Averill, Lori Moore-Merrell, Raymond T. Ranellone Jr., Craig G. Weinschenk, Nicole Taylor, Randy Goldstein, Robert Santos, Doug Wissoker, Kathy Notarianni, Kathryn Butler
In order to balance community expectations with limited resources, the fire service and community leaders require scientific data that quantifies the effects of changes in fire service deployment on the safety of the public and firefighters. This report