254 - Communicating fire science with firefighters, with Steve Kerber

Five Years And A New Mission

Wojciech Wegrzynski 0:00

Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Fire Science Show. you know what? It's, it's five years. It's five years since the first podcast episode with Guillermo, with Gabriel, uh, were released, and, uh, here we are five years later still discussing fire science with fire enthusiasts. And, uh, I said it a lot of times, but one thing that I've learned in the podcast for do- doing it for so long is the importance of communication, importance of, of this bi-directional avenue of transport of information between different stakeholders, because that's what communication is. It's not preaching. It's not evangelization. It's exchanging information and acting diligently on that information. I've even, uh, organized... Together with Felix Wizner, we've organized a, a webinar a month ago for the IAFSS, uh, for the research subcommittee, where we've spent two hours talking about how can we communicate more efficiently as fire researchers, as fire scientists. And that, that webinar included, uh, a few people and, uh, was kind of topically allocated. We talked about discussing it with lawmakers, with general audience, with the firefighters, with the industry professionals. And I thought that it should be my mission to bring those discussions also to the Fire Science Show, perhaps in a little bit more in-depth take. And so here we are today. And, uh, today we will discuss how to communicate fire science and engineering with, uh, with firefighters, which means how can we work together with the firefighters so they understand fire phenomena better and benefit from that knowledge in performing their job. And also, how can we, as fire researchers, understand the firefighters and their profession so that the research and science that we do makes more sense? And both avenues are not easy. Uh, we are living in the same world. We're touching the same fire problem, the same fire phenomena. The physics is the same, yet we end up seeing it a little bit differently. And, uh, for this, I have a fantastic guest. Uh, I'm s- I'm sitting down with, uh, Steve Kerber, the vice president of ULRI, Fire Safety Research Institute. Steve has been a propagator of communicating fire science, working with firefighters for a long time. I had Steve already in the podcast, and in this episode, we go very deep into how those two worlds can work together to, to get better outcomes. It's, uh, it's a story based on practice that Steve has. It's a success story of the FSRI in doing this exactly for the last 20 years, but it's also a lot of tangible knowledge, tangible information that anyone can apply to their own, uh, reality at different levels. So yeah, I'm looking forward to that, and, uh, I hope you enjoy this. Uh,

Sponsor Message From OFR Consultants

Wojciech Wegrzynski 3:28

let's spin the intro and jump into the episode The Fire Science Show podcast is brought to you in collaboration with OFR Consultants, a multi-award-winning independent consultancy dedicated to addressing fire safety challenges. OFR is the UK's leading fire risk consultancy that this year celebrates its 10th anniversary. As experts in fire engineering, they are fully committed to delivering preeminent expertise to protect people, property, and the environment. With over 30 chartered engineers and a team of fire researchers at their core, they continually explore the challenges that fire creates for their clients and society so that the best research, experience, and diligence can be applied for effective tailored solutions. In 2026, OFR will grow its team once again and is keen to hear from industry professionals who want to collaborate on fire safety features this year. Get in touch at olafarkconsultants.com. And now back to the episode

Steve Kerber And Speaking Both Worlds

Wojciech Wegrzynski 4:56

Hello, everybody. I am joined today by Steve Kerber, Vice President of FLRI. Hey, Steve.

Steve Kerber 5:02

How we doing?

Wojciech Wegrzynski 5:03

All good. All good. thanks for coming, uh, to the podcast. We, uh, had a very interesting, uh, webinar some time ago, uh, for the IFSS Research Subcommittee. We were talking about communicating fire science, and I thought I'm gonna pull all the, you know, uh, lecturers of the event, uh, further, and, uh, here you are, first in line. I would love to pull you forward on, communicating fire science and perhaps engineering to, to fire services. How do you feel about that?

Steve Kerber 5:29

Story of my life. I mean, I, I come from a fire service family, so I, I like to think that what's kind of guided my career, I speak both languages

Wojciech Wegrzynski 5:38

h- how did, you learn about fire, science or, or fire engine? How, how much did you learn before you started doing it professionally in your young years being, uh, in a, in a firefighters family?

Steve Kerber 5:48

So, I mean, I had no idea it existed until, I was looking for what university to go to.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 5:55

Really?

Steve Kerber 5:55

yeah, so had, had no idea it was a profession. but, like I said, I grew up in a fire service family. I was halfway decent at math and science. I was a volunteer firefighter, and my dad said, You like math and science, why don't you look around?" And, uh, I went to this old computer in the guidance counselor's office in high school and typed in like firefighting and science and math, and, uh, University of Maryland popped up as an

Wojciech Wegrzynski 6:24

Oh

Steve Kerber 6:24

so that was my first introduction to fire protection engineering and, started doing a whole lot of Google searches after that to figure out what it actually was.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 6:33

I mean, th-this kind of is an interesting opening because like Guillermo always says we're a secret society, you know, hidden from the eyes of, of the society doing our job, uh, silently. I mean, in the end, you know, we, we don't have enough people working in fire safety engineering for sure. Like anyone who finishes a fire safety engineering master's gets hired immediately. That's at least my experience so far. e-even if, you know, in the world of firefighting, this is not a well-known or well-established, you know, area, and we need to change this paradigm because I, I think fire science is, is critical for fighting fires as well. As much as fighting fires and understanding this part of socio-technical system we're in is critical for doing good fire science, right?

Steve Kerber 7:18

You're absolutely correct. I mean, it's, uh, the fire service I think is a key stakeholder anything that's done in the fire science space.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 7:28

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 7:28

Um, in many ways they're, they're the manual system that is there after many other attempts at creating safety layers fail. they're the ones that are there to pick up the pieces. So, it's kind of I think, society thinks about that whole ecosystem and not just the fire service at the end of it, and fire protection engineers play such a vital role a-ahead of that. and I think many ways the challenges have gotten harder and more complex than the fire service should be expected to be able to deal with.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 8:06

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 8:07

So that burden falls on every piece of the system before the fire service at that point.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 8:14

Hmm

Steve Kerber 8:14

standards, and clearly the fire safety engineers to make sure that those are followed, whether prescriptive performance-based

Wojciech Wegrzynski 8:24

Well, uh, we, we, we just had a, a conference in Poland th-this week, uh, yesterday, two days ago, and we, we, had the, let's say, the, the Polish chief of, of, uh, prevention, uh, from the National Fire Brigade. And, uh, it was about actually connecting operational side of firefighting with engineering side of designing buildings. So it was kind of an effort to, to clash those two worlds, and he said that there's nothing better for, operational, uh, firefighters than a well-designed building, you know? If, if that-- that, that's the best support you can give to operation, uh, guys on, on, on the ground during a fire if everything is, is designed very well. I've, uh, browsed through your, uh, PhD thesis. Well, you're not just, uh, you know, a director of research institute. You seem to be some sort of researcher as well in, in that, uh, in that sparse, uh, free time in between all, all the, all the important stuff that's happening. But you, you wrote a very interesting, thesis that is on utilizing research to enhas-enhance fire service knowledge. And interestingly, in, the m-objective of the thesis,

Why Safety Drives Fire Service Research

Wojciech Wegrzynski 9:30

you put forward that it is to improve firefighter safety, and that, that got me curious. Like, wh-why this aspect? Why, why not improve firefighter efficiency? I don't know, uh, chances to battle fire, fight larger fires. I-is this... There's, there's a reason that you've chosen safety as, as the objective.

Steve Kerber 9:47

Well, I, I think it, it's all one and the same at, at the end of the day. uh, it's really about knowledge,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 9:54

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 9:55

that I think there's a huge disconnect oftentimes between, the outcomes that firefighters think their tactics are going to accomplish and what science actually says is the outcome of what they're gonna do. And I mean, that was really driven by... I mean, when I started working at NIST and then working at UL, you work with enough fire departments around the world They think that different things are gonna happen out of doing the same thing, and it's, uh, it's like, why is this? Um, we often use the scenario in the United States of like, well, New York City Fire Department does it one and the Los Angeles City Fire Department on the other side of the country does it a different way. If they're both responding to the same incident in the same structure with the similar resources, they both can't be right.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 10:45

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 10:46

So what is actually best for the occupant that's trapped in the structure? to make a very extreme example, science can tell us that. So I, I can make measurements that will say, what will this person be exposed to? So I can measure temperature, heat flux, gas concentration, all the things that would ultimately kill someone. And if I can create an environment and I-- let's say we're going to a 2,000 square foot house fire with fire in the bedroom, and there's an occupant in the bedroom next to the bedroom that's on fire, and the fire department shows up, and they're gonna do a series of things, and ultimately that person's gonna come out of that environment, I can measure what exposure that person would have had if they were an actual person with instruments. So there can't be multiple best ways to accomplish that task if, if the kind of importance is life safety first, then property conservation, incident stabilization, and environmental protection, if that's our measures of success, science can tell us which one's best. firefighters can't determine which one's best on an actual incident because they don't know all the inputs. They don't have control over all of the inputs. They don't know the variables. just doing what they were trained to do. Our goal with the research and what I was trying to accomplish with my, my thesis is let's base it on science, not on someone's experience under unknown conditions somewhere

Wojciech Wegrzynski 12:19

Which is an interesting, you know, um, interesting consideration. I had a time in my life where, uh, uh, some people would approach us and they would said, "Oh yeah, we're-- there's a road being built and there's like 20 houses to be demolished. Would you like to go and do a fire experiment in, in those?" And I'm like, "Hell yeah, well, uh, burn a house." That's like, uh, that's a nice, uh, that, that you don't have to convince me twice, you know? And what I've learned from, from doing, some of those ad hoc experiments in various settings is that, um, they're really difficult, you know, to get solid outcomes out of them. Like, kind of the randomness of the opportunity translates into randomness of the findings. They can be interesting. They can-- Uh, I'm not saying they cannot give you a new knowledge. They can give you some interesting observations. But for example, once you see an interesting phenomenon or interesting interaction, the building is already done and they're just build the road and you don't have a second one to, you know, test and validate your hypothesis. Like it's-- Today I w- I, I, I think more about this from the scientific method perspective, you know, how to control my variables, how to control my uncertainties. I don't like to, to do those ad hoc jobs because, uh, I mean, I, I like for the experience, but it's not really the most efficient way for me to do science today. And, and yeah. I, and I think, you know, uh, if I now think about, uh, firefighters' experience, it's also like a collection of those random incidents that they have been exposed to and build their, you know, collection of their experience, right?

Steve Kerber 13:56

You're exactly correct. And yeah, I mean, they have a bunch of, of randomness. They have a bunch of uncontrolled variables. They have a bunch of variables they would never even know if they even studied it. so what we've done in our research is, I mean, what, what you just explained there is, thing possible all 20 of those houses that they're tearing down are similar,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 14:20

Yeah

Steve Kerber 14:21

and you can burn in all 20 of them, uh, which is what we were able to do on Governors Island in New York City. They had 20 townhouses that they were burning down, so, or that they had to get rid of. So we went in and took all of the ones that were similar,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 14:36

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 14:36

furnished them with all of the same furnishings.

Controlled Testing Versus One Real Shot

Steve Kerber 14:40

Uh, so we went to a used hotel furniture place. I mean, that... where do I get 100 sofas for cheap? Uh, well, you, you start learning about the hotel industry real quick, that they've got hundreds or thousands as they empty these hotels out. Like, "I need 1,000 mattresses." "No problem. Here's 1,000 identical mattresses." so you, you find cheap ways to be able to... or economically feasible ways to accomplish that. And nice part about, say, those 20 houses, assuming they were similar, is you didn't have to pay to build them.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 15:14

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 15:15

Um, so for us, we typically have to pay to repair them and to make them similar. but we also do it in our lab, where I will build a, square foot colonial house and, uh, we will just have a budget to repair it back to the way it was many times as we need to make the tests as close to the same to control variables the best we can. So if, uh, you wanna fight that fire 10 different ways in the lab, I can fight it 10 different ways. In the street, the firefighters are only gonna get one shot at it. They, they can't rewind the tape and say, "Man, I really wish I went in the back door instead of the front door on this fire."

Wojciech Wegrzynski 15:56

Yeah.

Steve Kerber 15:56

You know, they don't get that opportunity. In research, we do

Wojciech Wegrzynski 15:59

when you work with firefighters, Do you see this curiosity in, in those people you work with, that they would actually be wondering what would happen if we opened that door instead of this door? What would happen if we, like... That's a, that's an interesting concept because as soon as person realizes that things could have went differently, it sparks the question, why would it end up differently? And that opens you to a whole, you know, horizon of, of stuff you can learn.

Steve Kerber 16:26

Yeah, I mean, I, I was an active firefighter at a very busy fire station for more than 10 years. I still have fires that haunt me, where I wonder if I had some- done something different, would the outcome have been better? and it's, it's, it's probably one of the hardest things that comes with being in the fire service is the... You're making very challenging decisions under very tight time constraints with very limited information, and you do the best you can.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 16:54

Hmm?

Steve Kerber 16:55

But that doesn't keep you from replaying those incidents in your head unlimited numbers of times after the fact, um, when you've got the time to think about it. I mean, we do this in, in science too, right? Where it's like, "Oh, I ran an experiment. Man, I wish I had that thermocouple in a different place."

Wojciech Wegrzynski 17:11

Yes. Always 30 centimeters to the left, al- always.

Steve Kerber 17:15

I wish I protected that camera a

Wojciech Wegrzynski 17:17

Yeah.

Steve Kerber 17:17

better because I needed the 30 seconds after it

Wojciech Wegrzynski 17:19

Yeah, exactly.

Steve Kerber 17:21

my point." So it's... That, that same exact thing happens in firefighting every day. So it's, uh... So yes, lot of, uh, the inspiration for some of the experimental series we do is from conflicting experience,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 17:36

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 17:37

um, where people swore they experienced the same thing under the same conditions, but they clearly did not. Um, so we can use research to make sense of that, and that's the beauty of doing the research with the fire service, not for the fire service. So a, a, a lot of our effort is teaching the fire service about the scientific method, teaching them the limitations of measurement, teaching them the limitations of what you can do to make sure that what we ultimately do together provides them answers on the back end that they can actually use

Wojciech Wegrzynski 18:11

but does this imply that, uh, you expect them to carry their own fire science, if I may call it like that? Or

Steve Kerber 18:19

at fire science. They're never gonna do fire. I mean, that's the, the fire service uh, loves to do demonstrations. love to try and be at times, especially when they're trying to answer questions. but the truth of the matter is they never really have the resources to do it right.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 18:37

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 18:37

So that's where we've got to partner with them and, and do it together and make sure that they come along and are part of the decision-making all the way through the process. That way they're bought into what comes out the end

Wojciech Wegrzynski 18:50

Okay, but I assume if you got, uh, firefighters who are already engaged in that, you've already won the communication game because you already are there. How about those who are not as engaged? Because, because also I, from my perspective, uh, firefighters are not like one, uh, single body with the pope at the top, you know? Uh, I mean, they, they're kind of like bubbled, uh, you know, the departments are, are the units, but, i- is there's enough communication in between them? I'm not so sure i-i-if that propagates that easily. So, so how, how do you reach those, those far away that are not there

Building Buy In Through Partnership

Wojciech Wegrzynski 19:32

yet?

Steve Kerber 19:32

Oh, it's great, great question. Um, so yes, the fire service is probably the most group of people you can possibly find because, I mean, it's not, not just saying like, "Oh, how they do things in the United States is different how they do things in Poland." It's different, like, between crews at the same fire station on different days. I mean, that's how fragmented we're talking. So, I mean, this is a big watch-out for researchers or people that are trying to do stuff with the fire service. Like, you, you talk to a firefighter, you talk to a firefighter. you need to do the work to start figuring out, well, what What the fire service needs and what a subset of the fire service tells you could possibly be radically different.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 20:23

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 20:24

we go through a process, So first we have an advisory board of, of people that, that lead, that guides our which is typically folks that are like you described. They've, they've been involved in the research with us for so long that they're practically researchers themselves. They-- We, we've, we've made them bilingual. They can speak fire service and

Wojciech Wegrzynski 20:44

Ni

Steve Kerber 20:44

speak researcher. Um, there's still limitations there. I mean,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 20:48

They've learned by immersion the language

Steve Kerber 20:50

They're not formally educated in it, but they've, they've learned enough of it by being around us for a couple decades. and then for every project we're gonna do, we build what we call a fire service technical panel. Um, so these are people that apply to participate. So right off the bat, they, they wanna be engaged. They care, predominantly care about the fire service so much that they wanna make sure that what comes out is useful. And then we subbing that out. So you want, you want career firefighters and volunteer firefighters. You want urban firefighters. You want rural firefighters. You want folks that represent different geographies around the world. people that use different response matrices to people that use different equipment, people that have different experience. All of that you weigh in in this giant matrix, and you do your best to select 25 people that become the voice of the fire service,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 21:45

Hmm

Steve Kerber 21:46

you will. And I'm throwing air quotes up there, uh, for the podcast listeners,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 21:51

yeah.

Steve Kerber 21:51

because it's, it's impossible to do it holistically, but you, you do the best you can. And then another thing that often try and do is you look for-- It's just like the influencer world. You're, you're looking for people that are influential. Uh, you're looking for people that have particular expertise in certain things, and you wanna leverage that. Uh, early on we learned that it's like, hey, bring in some of the vocal minority that are against you and embrace them and figure out why that is, and try and turn that to a positive. Worst case scenario, um-

Wojciech Wegrzynski 22:28

Is the same.

Steve Kerber 22:29

It's the same. Yeah,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 22:30

Yeah

Steve Kerber 22:30

exactly. So, we do that quite a bit as well. But you're right, I mean, the fire service is incredibly fragmented, so you need to be careful. I mean, we see this a lot in the tech space,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 22:39

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 22:40

um, where entrepreneur, I'm gonna make the next greatest widget that is gonna save everyone's lives, and well, why are, why are you doing that? What problem are you solving? Like, "Well, I went and talked to a firefighter."

Wojciech Wegrzynski 22:54

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 22:54

And it's like, well, that person was pro- E- everyone involved in that is well-intentioned, but the chances that something useful is gonna come out of that, unless you do more due diligence, is, is really low.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 23:06

I, I see that not just in the entrepreneurial space, I see that in science as well. We've developed this new method to, uh, calculate, uh, temperature in post-flashover fire, uh, so, uh, the firefighters can get this information as soon as they enter the building. And like, have you ever talked to a firefighter? Like, like are, are-

Steve Kerber 23:27

you're spot on. No, it's, it's frustrating as hell. I mean, and some of these people will get grants because the people reviewing don't know the fire service either,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 23:36

Hmm

Steve Kerber 23:37

and it becomes a giant potential waste of resources. Um, yeah, that stuff drives us nuts

Wojciech Wegrzynski 23:43

Yeah. But an-anyway, g-going back to, to your example. Okay, y-you get this, um, this, this bo-board, you engage with a lot of people. That, that is... But that is for you to do good job. Yeah, like, that, that the job that you do is, is not burdened with this assumption or presumption of what the firefighters might want, but you put an, uh, an, uh, effort to, to understand this. I'm, I wonder how to reach with this outcome through the line firefighter. Like, what do they read? What do they watch? What do they listen to? I hope Fire Science Show, but my statistics don't confirm that. But like, you know, what is the pathway that you reach a line firefighter on duty in Alabama with, with this science?

Steve Kerber 24:30

Yeah, that's-- it's really hard. I had a fire chief that when I was a young, passionate firefighter and, uh, thought I knew all the right ways to do things, and he said that, uh, like, "It's, it's good that you're motivated and all that other stuff, but pe-people, people participate at different levels."

Wojciech Wegrzynski 24:49

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 24:49

Not everybody

Navigating A Fragmented Fire Service

Steve Kerber 24:50

is, gung ho, do the right thing, learn as much as you can learn, uh, educate yourself as much as you possibly can because you could die doing this. Like, one would think, like, everybody wants to know everything they can possibly know. That is just not, not the case. you've gotta do a lotta, a lotta market research. I mean, you've gotta understand, uh, do these people care about? Uh, where are they? How do they spend their time? Where do they learn? Where do they get information? So, um, we've built tremendous networks with all of the firefighting magazines, of the people that do training and all of that. Um, you've gotta, you gotta reach them where they are, so you gotta understand where they go for information. Where, where do they, where do they fish?

Wojciech Wegrzynski 25:36

Hmm

Steve Kerber 25:37

so you've gotta do the best you can, and then ultimately over time, we've actually built probably one of the biggest channels for the fire service just by being consistent for 20-plus years being somewhere that they go for information.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 25:54

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 25:55

Um, we've got a free learning management system that we created specifically to tailor to the fragmented fire service, uh, to make it just as easy and accessible for the two-person volunteer department as it is for the 10,000-person career department, Fire Safety Academy. uh, we've got 175,000 active users

Wojciech Wegrzynski 26:18

That's not--

Steve Kerber 26:19

learning management system. we're making progress. It's, it's always-- it's a grind, and it's,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 26:25

Yeah

Steve Kerber 26:25

a desire to do better

Wojciech Wegrzynski 26:27

Brilliant. So, so this is for the ones who, who, who want that. I'm also wondering how about those who don't want it? Who, who are not,

Steve Kerber 26:36

Great point. Uh, so we also do a lot in the standards. Uh,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 26:41

Yeah

Steve Kerber 26:41

there's, there's minimum training standards for firefighters in the United States. some states requirement, require it, some don't.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 26:49

C- sorry, c- could you explain to me in, like, one minute how does the training look like? Like, where do they train?

Steve Kerber 26:55

So it's all over the place. Um, it could be, they've got a local-- have something at their individual fire station. Uh, they could have something at, like, a county or city level. there's state training academies that exist in just about every state.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 27:12

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 27:12

Um, so there is no one way.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 27:16

Okay

Steve Kerber 27:16

you said, man, I wish there was a pope that I could take stuff to and everybody goes through a single training academy, and everybody gets the same information at the same quality, uh, that greatly prepares them for what they're gonna experience. I mean, some states have little to no training requirements

Wojciech Wegrzynski 27:32

In, in Poland that kind of is the, the thing. Like that, that's why it, it's kind of funny the world is very different at different levels. In Poland, you would have a specialist like schools to, uh, teach firefighters. There would be a school for line firefighters. There would be a separate school for officers, which is like a university course where they also do fire safety engineering, for example. So it's, uh, it's like obviously a different set of circumstances everywhere. That's, that's why I ask. So I assume like in, in reaching everyone, whether they like it or not, it's the guidance, it's the tactical considerations. how do you enhance them with science? Like is it just basing them on, on scientific principle and writing them in the fire speak? Or do you also, you know, take some of the fire science and put it in there so they understand the context?

Steve Kerber 28:23

Uh, I think the best way to put it is we simplify, we don't dumb down.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 28:28

Okay

Steve Kerber 28:29

So, the training that is written for firefighters in the US is written to an eighth grade learning level.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 28:38

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 28:39

Um, so for us, that's the end of middle school before you go to high school. So these people are normally, say, 13, 14 years old.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 28:48

Hmm?

Steve Kerber 28:48

Um, so those are kind of the language that needs to be used. And a- as you know, you, you can't even say fire dynamics and have it fit into an eighth grade level. So what we need to do is we need to explain concepts and give practical applications of concepts so that we are teaching them not only the what to do, but the, the why behind it. Um, so we will, we will use a lot of analogies. We will try and reference the things that people understand. Um, you talk about heat transfer, you're talking about cups of coffee and stuff like that and, and the heating of the mug and the heating of your hand and all of those things and, and, trying to explain flashover and radiation and the basic.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 29:36

L- can we do this in, in more detail? Like how how would you explain a flashover or, or, or like a more complex like ventilation limited fire in that level?

Steve Kerber 29:45

Sure. So, I mean, ventilation limited fires is an incredibly important concept that was not well understood years ago, let's say. so we will do it through typically a lot of video.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 29:57

Okay

Steve Kerber 29:57

so you will, you will match the video. So we will have numerous flashovers, whether a single compartment, or multiple rooms, you name it, and we'll show a simple time temperature curve show them the video of, of what is happening. and it's not hard to put a single doorway on a room, leave that door open, flash that room over, uh, show them the neutral plane, show them the transition, show them the radiation to the floor, and then shut that door

Wojciech Wegrzynski 30:28

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 30:29

and then show the temperature drop. And they're like, "Well, wait a minute. How, how is that possible? We're trapping the heat in the room." like, well, no, you're not. You cut off the oxygen. That fire can no longer continue to grow.

Simplify Without Dumbing It Down

Steve Kerber 30:40

The temperature is going down. And you start putting essentially graphs and good visuals with video and start explaining the concepts to them.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 30:51

Do, do you use any equations with that?

Steve Kerber 30:53

Usually, no. Uh, we stay, we stay away from equations. Um, is where myself and my partner Dan Madrzykowski will, uh, will vary at times depending on the audience. He will, he will throw the equations up, but he does it in such a way where he's describing the components of the equation so they know the c- the variables that matter.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 31:16

kind of like a cake recipe.

Steve Kerber 31:19

Yes.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 31:19

for the flashover cake, you need the door size, the, height of the door, and, uh, that's... Well, you're almost there

Steve Kerber 31:28

Well, and, and then you've gotta understand why that matters to them, right? So it's like you, you need to be able to describe to them the scenarios where, the difference between a door open and a door closed could be minutes of either, a victim surviving under certain conditions or their ability to operate to accomplish what they need to accomplish. you start understanding some of these time windows, and then it starts dawning on them, okay, what tactics do I have to accomplish this? So it's like I've got a compartment that's gonna flash over and I can mess with the water, can mess with the air,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 32:07

Hmm

Steve Kerber 32:08

pretty much the two levers that they can pull, and you've gotta teach them to pull those levers at the appropriate times under the right conditions for what they're trying to accomplish

Wojciech Wegrzynski 32:19

Does previous experience in firefighting makes it easier or harder to explain those concepts?

Steve Kerber 32:26

Both. depends how good that experience is. mean, we, we have firefighters all around this world that we kind of joke. It's like they-- Let's say you've got a 30-year career, they've got one year of experience 30 times,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 32:39

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 32:39

because they really didn't understand what was happening in front of them, so they never really altered their approach or better understood it. They just kind of assumed that's the way it is. a lot of the positive stories out of our research has been making people's experience make more sense to them.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 32:58

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 32:58

So it's, uh, "Oh, that's why that happens. Okay, now that I know the cause and effect relationship of that, I now know how to apply that better going forward. I now know, I now know how to teach that to the new firefighter and add the why as opposed to do that's what has gotten us into trouble as a fire service industry for a long time, is it's a whole lot of just do, do the task without the explanation as to, well, wh-why? Under what conditions do I do it, and under what conditions do I not do it? and that's dangerous.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 33:35

H-h-how about, uh, other concepts like, uh, fast water? I think that, that was a big change in shifting tactics, which must have been scientifically, uh, supported. I, I think it is.

Steve Kerber 33:46

That was kind of an accident. Um, so mean, have been taught my entire fire service career, don't apply water from the outside 'cause you could push the fire into other places in the building. Um, and one of my first series of experiments that I was in charge of when I moved to, to UL was looking at horizontal ventilation. so we had built a single-story ranch house and a two-story colonial house, we were looking at the differences between a house that was fairly compartmented with a bunch of different rooms separated by doors, houses that have, like, big wide open floor plans, and you can kind of see from one side to the next. and we were studying, uh, what happens when you open a door, what happens when you open a window, what happens if the window is near the seat of the fire, far from the seat of the fire, on the first floor, on the second floor. Um, so a lot of basics of ventilation. I had to use these houses 20 times to do enough experiments, so I had to put the fire out somehow, and I didn't have any trained firefighters to help me put the fires out, so I had a bunch of technicians that are used to running standard tests, uh, but they're not trained to do interior firefighting.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 35:06

Hmm?

Steve Kerber 35:07

So when the test is like, all right, I'm doing a, a vent near the seat of the fire, window opens, flash over, fire out the window. All right, test is over. I've got all my measurements. Put the fire out. gave them a hose line and told them, "Flow water in the window."

Wojciech Wegrzynski 35:26

Hmm?

Steve Kerber 35:26

And they flow water in the window and fire goes out.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 35:30

But you're not supposed to do that

Steve Kerber 35:31

so yeah, it's like,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 35:32

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 35:36

another window and all of those things. And I mean, looking at all my data, and I've got thermocouple trees everywhere in these houses, and it's like, man, I didn't even see a little spike in temperature. It all immediately went down. So at that point I'm questioning myself am I making bad measurements? Uh, what is happening? Well, maybe I need to like shield all of the thermocouple trees to make sure that there's no chance of direct water impingement and, all of that stuff. And it just turns out that, wow, water puts out fire. Who would've, who would've thought?

Wojciech Wegrzynski 36:10

I mean, i-if you're so well embedded in a paradigm, it's very difficult to question it because, like, you're literally a part of it, you know? It's a part of you. Uh, that, that's, that's all you know. it requires a very curious mind or, like, an accidental discovery or someone coming from the outside not knowing the paradigm to change it. Otherwise, it's impossible to break it because you're, you're so much embedded with it. And that, that's also why I find it a little bit difficult to get with the fire science into the world of fi- uh, firefighters because we don't necessarily

Teaching Ventilation Limited Fire Visually

Wojciech Wegrzynski 36:45

share the same paradigms, you know? We, we-- I don't think we have this, the common understanding of what fire phenomena is, uh, uh, and you know, h-how it behaves, how it grows, how it develops, what changes it, uh, w-where it goes. And if we lack this common understanding of the problem at hand, if I share some ideas on solutions, uh, with them, I'm not speaking their language

Steve Kerber 37:08

And you, it, it's really hard to know their reality, but the more and closer you can get to understand their reality, the more trust you build, the more you let each other into each other's world.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 37:21

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 37:22

Um, so in research, we live in a very controlled environment. Everything is about control. I mean, everything is about making sure that it fits within our parameters and, within our safety requirements, within whatever our facility can handle. Um, the fire service very much works in a world where it's all unknowns or a ton of unknowns and a, and a, and a lack of control, their job is to gain the upper hand and gain control. you will say things that, "Oh, well, science tells us this," and their immediate response to that is gonna be like, "Well, okay, well, you think people won't do this, or this won't happen, or you think everyone's gonna, uh... If you design a building to, uh, the perfect code and the perfect standards, and guess what's gonna happen? You're gonna put people in that building, and they're gonna find ways to defeat all of the assumptions that you're making for what's gonna happen in that building." Um, and they see it every day, um, so they don't wanna be told, "Oh, you're under-- Believe this controlled environment." Um, it's a really hard bridge to, to cross together.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 38:32

Mm.

Steve Kerber 38:32

but once you get there and once you build that trust, and I think a lot of our success was around, uh, bounding the problem appropriately.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 38:41

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 38:42

So if we can think of the worst possible thing that could ever happen given these set of conditions, let's figure out what that is. That way we're working from a place of reality as opposed to, like, all, all of our criticism early on is like, "Well, you're, you're in a lab. Like, clearly the fire is not gonna be the same. You're in a lab." And it's like, "Well, yeah, I'm in a lab, I've got a giant house built in the lab, and I'm putting realistic furnishings in it." And it's like, "All right, well, you're, putting enough realistic furnishings. You're not doing it right." So it's like, "Okay." So we stage a test. It's like, "I'm gonna fill it with furniture. Like, I'm just gonna stack it full of furniture." And what happens? Well, you displace oxygen.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 39:28

Yes

Steve Kerber 39:29

you can make the fire not as bad with more fuel. so again, it's, it's getting to that, having them understand the scientific principles in a way that they can see

Wojciech Wegrzynski 39:39

w-with this, you've already sparked the curiosity. I think the moment you spark curiosity and there are questions being asked, this is an opening through which you can get in because why? Like go why five times and you reach extremely interesting place, right? an-another question that comes to my mind, you know, in, in, in, in terms of, you know, get- going out with the science, what about science that's incomplete? Like a lot of fire science is incomplete by definition. We had 150 years to discuss compartment fires and, uh, you know, uh, Tornton's oxygen rules and Kawagoe's, uh, compartment fires, Philip Thomas', and you can like spend an entire century talking about compartment, uh, fires and researching them. But h-h-how long is a career of line firefighter? 25, 30 years.

Steve Kerber 40:31

Yeah, approximately

Wojciech Wegrzynski 40:32

In 30, in 30 years you could go, uh, windows that into airtight buildings with a e-scooter inside and a passive house that's, that almost has no ventilation through it within a career of a single person. A fire that they trained on when they went through the formal training is a, a museum, is a dinosaur

Steve Kerber 40:57

You're spot on. And, and that, that actually opened many doors for us,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 41:02

Okay

Steve Kerber 41:03

um, because again, it, it... No firefighter wants to be told... So the, the, so the fire service, I think anywhere in the world, is kind of a paramilitary hierarchical,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 41:16

Hmm?

Steve Kerber 41:17

situation where you've got your, those that have, those that haven't yet, and those that are gonna follow along, and is gaining experience. And the more experience you have, the, the better at it

The Accidental Lesson Behind Fast Water

Steve Kerber 41:30

you must be. of course, we also have many generations. I mean, my, my grandfather was a firefighter, my dad was a firefighter, I was a firefighter. That gave me an opportunity that my entire life I was exposed to whatever their experience was, and it was kind of on them to pass their experience to me so I didn't have to experience things myself. And, like, the goal was always to speed up the learning, um, because I think the, the, like you said, the environment gets more challenging, it gets different, it evolves. So that makes this group of people that much less receptive to anything that doesn't match what they're used to.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 42:08

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 42:09

What one simple demonstration of two rooms on fire, one with natural materials and one with synthetic materials lit on fire next to each other, I think changed many firefighters, uh, their understanding, didn't completely make sense to them, and therefore opened their minds to, "Oh, wait a minute. Maybe we're fighting a different fire today than our predecessors fought in the past." So that opened the door for us to say, you got taught in the past was not wrong. Your fire environment evolved, and now how you need to treat it is different. So the tactics that you were taught in the past were right. good." My grandfather fought fires with sofas and cotton carpets, and it, it just burned slower.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 43:05

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 43:06

Could it reach flashover? Yes. just took longer to get there,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 43:10

Hmm.

Steve Kerber 43:10

which means the response time lines up in a different place, what they're seeing when they get there, and how quickly it responds

Wojciech Wegrzynski 43:17

The priority is everything, right? Is

Steve Kerber 43:19

changes. now it's okay to open your mind to the research because the fire environment's evolving. It's not because I'm giving in to the researchers and the scientists, it because

Wojciech Wegrzynski 43:32

Yeah, yeah

Steve Kerber 43:32

what my predecessors were taught is now different, so now I can open my mind a little bit.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 43:37

Uh, what do you think in all of this is the role of, uh, props and demonstrations? So you, you brought up the video, uh, and the, the video of the, of the two timelines of, of a fire Uh, I, I know you, you're also building a lot of props. I've seen the, uh, water bouncing, transparent house prop, uh, a lot of those. Do, do you find those tools important in, in this?

Steve Kerber 43:59

The props are incredibly important. Um, it's actually a, a big translation tool that we've come to rely on where, firefighters are very visual learners. They're also very hands-on people.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 44:13

Mm-hmm

Steve Kerber 44:13

Um, so if you know the science is sound you can create a way for them to see it, touch it, feel it, the chance that they are going to embrace it goes up dramatically. Um, it also creates that muscle memory, is really important on the fire ground. so if you want them to flow the water to a particular location in a particular way, make a prop that shows them why that's important.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 44:42

Mm-hmm. Uh,

Steve Kerber 44:43

so we've done that a lot

Wojciech Wegrzynski 44:44

and, uh, how do you feel about props that, uh, don't have the, the full scale, like dollhouse props, et cetera? Because I mean, you can demonstrate some concepts, some basic concepts on those, but also I think at that scale you need to understand the fire physics a little bit more to understand how that would translate into large scale events

Steve Kerber 45:09

Couldn't agree more. Um, I mean, we, I mean, in our world, we know how fire scales or doesn't scale, and from length scale to time scale and everything else. And I mean, if, if if you even told the fire service something to the five-thirds power, they would laugh at you. Um, like, the not, not a chance, right? Um, so, it's, it's all about the buildup and, and the context. Um, so I was against for a long time. I was against some of these small-scale props 'cause I thought we were missing things in translation that could be dangerous.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 45:43

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 45:43

Um, I've actually grown to kind of appreciate them because, again, we can't... w-while we can do research at the full scale, it's hard to teach at the full scale. so if you put the right learning materials around the prop, they can be very useful tools. And this is something that mentor, Stefan Svensson from Sweden, was doing this a, a, a long, long time ago, and have evolved it. but it's... You, you've gotta have the limitations clearly explained that people

Trust, Reality, And Bounding The Problem

Steve Kerber 46:20

understand it. I mean, vent-limited fires, you, you can make a vent-limited fire in a small box the same way you can a full-size room. You've got to explain to them that the time at which this is gonna happen and what needs to be burning at the same time is different in this wood-lined box as it is in a furnished drywall room in a house. Um, however, the signs of the fire evolving and changing might be similar. Um, so y- it, it really takes a lot of teaching to go with the prop. It really is as good as the instructor.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 46:56

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 46:57

so we spend a lot of time building instructor guides and instructor tools to go with those props, um, 'cause we don't want the wrong messages being sent.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 47:05

in my limited interactions with the fire service, there is one space where I see a tremendous victory of science and like this overwhelming acceptance of the science in fire service, and that is, uh, firefighters' safety in terms of cancer prevention, cleanliness. like today, the firefighters are the cleanest people, uh, I, I know. You know, I-- when I grew up, the firefighter was the dirty guy, uh, you know, sweaty with an ax. Uh, today, they understand it and it's not-- I mean, of course, it's due unfortunately, very sadly, there's also a lot of anecdotal proof that, that definitely, you know, uh, moves the needle a lot. But the science is there to explain that it's not bad luck or accident or something wrong with the person. It's just we have to approach stuff differently to prevent that stuff, right?

Steve Kerber 48:04

So we've, we've made a ton of progress there, and it's, I think, a huge success story of where I will say technical research meets health research. Um, so I mean, one of our early partnerships, let's see, 15-plus years ago, was FSRI did the fire environment. Uh, the University of Illinois did the human measurements, um, and ergonomics and things along those lines. And then NIOSH, our National In- Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, did the blood, the urine, the,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 48:48

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 48:48

the inside the firefighter. So it was like environment, the firefighter, in the firefighter, and we were able to measure chemicals even after protecting their airway, that the chemicals could move from the burning furnishings to the skin, through the skin into the blood and cause problems. it's, it's one of these very challenging multidisciplinary problems, so many organizations, a lot of universities, a lot of federal agencies around the world, kind of chipped in to do the research that ultimately all got pieced together to IARC, International Association for Cancer, that determined that there's enough scientific basis that the profession of firefighting is inherently carcinogenic.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 49:43

Hmm

Steve Kerber 49:44

Um, so that got fed by a whole lot of people in the fire service having people die around them from cancer, to the point where they were willing to change their behaviors

Wojciech Wegrzynski 49:55

Suddenly it's not an accident, it's not bad luck, it's, it's like the outcome of the, of the profession, uh, where you have to be. But the, I, I find this as a tremendous, you know, success of science with the, the, the firefighters. Um, w- we're time limit- limited, but I would like to flip it for the end. Um, how about a fire researcher, you know, a person who does fire research, who studies, who does simulation, who works in a laboratory at the university? How do they get to understand fire service a little bit better?

Steve Kerber 50:31

Yeah. So one, there's a tremendous body of knowledge that they can read. There's, there's-- Your literature search has to include what's already happened, what's already been done, so that understand the science space, uh, to make sure you're not repeating the science, uh, without doing it on purpose. so once you understand your own world, then you need to step into the, the fire service world. And it can be as simple as, looking for topics that you're passionate about and finding firefighters that are also passionate about those particular topics. I mean, it went from 25 years ago when I was

Props, Scaling Limits, And Better Instructors

Steve Kerber 51:10

doing this, and if you said research and fire service, those two things did not go together at all, now, you're finding firefighters that are partners on research projects, um, that, yeah, they don't have the formal education, they don't have the PhDs, but they understand the scientific process enough that they can, they can help you along. They can, they can be that bridge for you to understand their world enough to make sure that the work that you're doing is relevant. Um, and I think this goes for all innovation. I

Wojciech Wegrzynski 51:44

Mm-hmm.

Steve Kerber 51:45

anyone that is doing innovation, I, I believe that they're, they're trying to solve a problem. So you need to make sure that your problem or the need that you're trying to fill is real. and you don't hear it one way from one person at one place, but it's actually a problem that needs to be solved. And if you can hear from-- I mean, there's also a whole lot of like research roadmaps that are now being created, where the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation, we've partnered with them numerous times to create these research roadmaps, which are actually identifying problems and research questions that are worth solving,

Wojciech Wegrzynski 52:31

Hmm

Steve Kerber 52:31

um, and kind of put some priority around it, um, so that you're, you're tackling a relevant challenge. And it's not one firefighter said it, it's representatives from the entire community have come together and said, "This is a challenge that needs to be taken on." Um, and I-- there's no shortage of them

Wojciech Wegrzynski 52:52

Yeah, I can imagine. I wonder how the, mm, we just had a podcast episode on NERIS. I wonder how the new data, how the new insight into, uh, the, the profession will, will also open those new f- fields o- o- of, of research, you know?

Steve Kerber 53:07

Yeah, I think we're gonna see trends that we've never seen before or that maybe they've been there and we haven't noticed them, um, because we didn't have the tools then that we do now. Um, so I think Neoros is gonna be a game changer. I mean, we're, we're very much looking at it as, uh, this is gonna direct our research for the next 100 years

Wojciech Wegrzynski 53:26

let's, uh, uh, hope for that. So, um, for, for finishing, uh, i- if you had to summarize this in, in, in one nice, you know, advice for fellow researchers, engineers in, in, in how to improve their, impact on firefighter or their link with firefighters. I wonder if they, they need to... I, I, I think it, it should be an ambition of, of people because we're two sides of the same profession, you know? And if we do our job great, firefighters will have, um, an easier time and le- they, they will be less, uh, less subject to, to, to risks, uh, et cetera. So I think it's important.

Steve Kerber 54:06

We need more interaction. it's, uh... I think we, we can also criticize ourselves as researchers or fire protection engineers or the science community that, uh, we tend to just, like, read stuff from our own colleagues. We go to conferences that are, our profession first. when's the last time that you went to a conference for people building buildings? sure those associations are out there, and I'm sure those conferences are happening. What are they talking about?

Wojciech Wegrzynski 54:37

Hmm

Steve Kerber 54:37

Um, like step, step into their world a little bit. Get out, get out of the comfort zone. if you wanted to go to a firefighter conference every day for the next year, you probably could.

Wojciech Wegrzynski 54:48

Yeah.

Steve Kerber 54:49

all, all over the world, all different topics. And, uh, it would be great that if you, if you find something that is in your wheelhouse of subject matter, find a fire service conference that that would be a part of, and go hear what they're saying about it

Wojciech Wegrzynski 55:09

Okay, Steve, thank you so much for, uh, for joining, uh, Fire Science Show and sharing, uh, your knowledge on how to improve the knowledge of firefighters with science. And, uh, I hope this reaches out a lot of curious people in the fire science community and also a lot of curious firefighters in the firefighting community. And I hope, uh, those two groups of curious people, uh, you know, united by the same interesting phenomenon, uh, will work together for, for the better

Steve Kerber 55:38

Outstanding. Appreciate the platform that

Cancer Prevention And Behavior Change

Steve Kerber 55:40

you provide And that's it. Thank you for listening. I hope you found some interesting, uh, stuff in what Steve said. I've enjoyed it thoroughly. I like the way how he's storytelling. That's also an, uh, important aspect of communicating well the fire science. But he's talking about, you know, down-to-earth problems and solutions to those problems, and how to get more involved with the firefighters, how to get firefighters more involved with us at various levels, and how we can get involved more with them. Because in the end, we're solving the same problem together, and And it's kind of stupid to pretend we can reach our solution without firefighters, and it's kind of silly to assume that, uh, without good fire safety engineering, the firefighters will, uh, be doing the same job literally. Um, however, the one thing that, that's kind of difficult and perhaps is, uh, a place of disconnect is what, what Steve said that, uh, firefighters seeing, you know, all the changes in the built environment, all the, uh, you know, failed firewalls, uh, broken fire doors, uh, unmaintained systems, you know, stuff that they observed that was not working as, as intended. Given that image in their heads, it's very difficult for them to expect or trust that when we say them that, "Oh, yeah, this, this system will solve this," it's very difficult for them to trust those systems. And I think that's a part of our job as well to improve that trust to the systems. Well, first we have to make sure that we have the trust to, to those systems, and, uh, reliability statistics is not something that come, uh, easily at hand. But, uh, we'll, we will, we'll eventually get there. Uh, for today's episode, that's it, and I just wanted to once again say thank you for being here with me for all of those five years of podcasting. It's kind of insane that, uh, it's already five years of doing the Fire Science Show. I hope we're doing a good job. I hope we're-- I hope you are enjoying the podcast. Uh, whether you, uh, listened for 250 episodes since the beginning or you have just jumped into the podcast, I hope you're having a good time. And if it's something that you've discovered recently, the library is vast. There's no, um, timeline component to the episodes. It's not news. It's knowledge, so they don't really age too much. So

How Researchers Learn The Fire Service

Steve Kerber 58:20

i- if you have an topic that sparks your curiosity or if you have, you know, a thing that is a part of your work, a part of your world that you would like to, get better at or, or learn better or, or, or do better, I think it's, uh, fair to say that, uh, you should be able to find an episode about that in the library. I think that's, that's the change in the podcast with the maturity of it, that we've covered so much already. And yet so much to be covered in the podcast that, uh, it's, it's a growing library for, for all of you to enjoy. I am enjoying it every day when I-- while I'm doing this, every week, uh, while I'm doing this, and, uh, I hope to be doing this for a much longer time. So yeah, once again, thank you for being here with me and, uh, I hope you, you have a great week. Next week, I'm at IFSS in La Rochelle. Uh, what a conference to be held, uh, the beating heart of fire science. I have to be there, and I'm very looking forward to all the conversations, new ideas. I'll probably fill up the guest list for the next year at that one event. So g- yeah, cross your fingers that we get some very interesting speakers for the Fire Science Show in the near future. I will be sure to get that. Uh, thanks for being here with me, and no matter where in France, uh, there's, uh, a Fire Science Show episode heading your way next Wednesday. Thank you. Bye.