Fire Science and Technology

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This paper describes an evaluation of the performance of a fast response residential sprinkler system in a simulated apartment in the event of a fire caused by a burning television set. The evaluation was conducted in an 8m × 4m × 2.4m high gypsum plasterboard lined compartment. A 1.2 m² lobby was used to represent an adjoining room and a standard hollow core door connected the two spaces. The compartment was fitted with two pendent mounted fast response residential sprinkler heads, and the television sets were located in one corner of the compartment. A series of 21 tests was conducted using a tea light candle against the outside of the television casing as the ignition source. Gas analysis for CO, CO₂, O₂ was carried out along with measurements of visual obscuration, compartment temperature and mass loss of the fuel. Tenability conditions within the compartment were determined using Fractional Effective Dose calculations. The results showed that the sprinkler system did not respond well to the television fires. Conditions within the compartment approached or exceeded tenable limits on a number of occasions. In some instances the television set burned out completely without activating the sprinkler system.

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Within three days immediately after earthquake fire often breaks out. When fire fighters cannot approach such a structure because of traffic congestion caused by earthquake, it is necessary to prevent somehow the structure from collapsing. Assuming that a steel building frame undergoes permanent relative horizontal story displacement and girder hinge due to an earthquake and it is subsequently subjected to fire, this paper has studied the ultimate temperature of the damaged structure. To this end, refined finite element analyses as well as a simplified theoretical analysis have been conducted. It is found that their ultimate temperatures are more or less decreased compared with those of frames without damage due to earthquakes.

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