Fire Science, Engineering And Education Episodes

The current hot-topics in fire science and engineering
Dec. 15, 2021

031 - Suppressing tunnel fires with water mist with Johny Jessen

Can water mist be used in tunnels? I wondered that for a long time, and with every tunnel project, many questions around this issue were piling in my head. When dealing with large infrastructure projects you really need to w…
Dec. 1, 2021

029 -Busses, flammability and an unknown force holding good solutions back... with Anja Hofmann-Böllinghaus

This is not a fun episode. It starts with a tragedy, that fueled a whole field of research. Continues into disbelief, that one aspect of fire safety can be at the same chosen as the sole foundation of fire safety within a br…
Nov. 3, 2021

025 - Structural fire engineering with engineered timber with Felix Wiesner

In Episode 18 we have touched on the important topic of fire performance of engineered wood and its wide use in the modern built environment. Today, we follow up on this subject with Dr Felix Wiesner from the University of …
Oct. 27, 2021

024 - Who's a Fire Safety Engineer with Jimmy Jönsson

Who is a Fire Safety Engineer? And when do you become one? How do you know the person on the other side of the table at the project meeting has the necessary competencies to judge fire safety solutions of a building you desi…
Oct. 13, 2021

022 - Combustion, fluid mechanics and fire safety engineering with Michael Gollner

https://firelab.berkeley.edu/ this is the place you need to go! Ignition at different slope angles. Firebrand spotting. Fire whirls. What does connect these various fire phenomena? They are all driven by fluid dynamics and c…
Sept. 29, 2021

020 - Fire Safety Engineering as a socio-technical system with Brian Meacham

Do you sometimes feel that fire safety engineering is not making a footprint as it should? With all our knowledge, models, technology...why do huge fires exist? Why fire is such a threat to billions of humans? In today's epi…
Sept. 21, 2021

019 - Modelling human behaviour in wildfire evacuation with Erica Kuligowski

There is plenty of fire engineers who think they are modelling human behaviour... Some claim they can do it... And there is very, very few who actually did and succeeded with it. One of them is today's guest, Dr Erica Kuligo…
Sept. 15, 2021

018 - Engineered timber with Danny Hopkin

Engineered timber is on a trajectory to become the construction material of the future. However, on that pathway there stands the fire issue. Wood burns, it is inevitable. This is something we must accept, and learn to work …
Aug. 25, 2021

015 - Global view on the fire safety from a starchitect perpective with Benjamin Ralph

Have you ever wondered who truly has the most power over the fire safety of a building? In my opinion, the answer is very simple - the Architect. This is due to two reasons. First is that the architect can affect the buildin…
Aug. 18, 2021

014 - A joyrney through the scales of fire phenomena with Sara McAllister

Have you ever wondered how is a fire of a match or candle different from a wildfire? Or maybe rather, why is it different? What is it, that makes the fires at different scales behave in such a different manner? What are the …
Aug. 11, 2021

013 - On the use and abuse of CFD in fire engineering with Wolfram Jahn

We are living in a kind of weird time, where the most complex tool we have is at the same time the most commonly used (and abused one). The Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modelling has brought us amazing capabilities in …
Aug. 4, 2021

012 - Science, Industry, Legislators. How do we make them work together on a fire safe world? - Kees Both

In this episode, I had the pleasure and privilege to host dr Kees Both, the Technical Manager of Standards & Regulations in Etexgroup. Kees wanted to become a suspension bridge engineer, but his route went through a fire lab…
July 28, 2021

011 - Why temperature is so easy to measure but so hard to interpret?

What is the single most measured thing in fire science? The answer is easy - temperature. We use it everywhere - from learning material properties in TGA's to expressing conditions in compartment fires. We use it at the same…
July 13, 2021

009 - Cognitive biases and decision making in evacuation with Michael Kinsey

Why do we take certain decisions during an evacuation process? How do we choose the evacuation route? These are often affected by cognitive biases, which is the main theme of today's episode. With Dr Michael Kinsey we will d…
July 7, 2021

008 - Zone modelling is not dead with Colleen Wade

Zone modelling is a technique introduced in 1970's and 80's that has changed fire science. In my personal opinion, along with oxygen calorimetry and the development of FDS it may have been the most impactful tool of fire sci…