Episodes
037 - Human behavior misconceptions that lead to (mis)modelling with Enrico Ronchi
Feb. 9, 2022
If you were investigating phenomena and built your whole narrative around a flawed and debunked concept, would that get published? Would that get cited? Would that be recognized? Many of us would say an obvious *no*, but tha…
036 - Researching fire with firefighters - UL FSRI: Steve Kerber and Craig Weinschenk
Feb. 2, 2022
In this episode I was really happy to host two amazing researchers from UL FSRI - Dr Steve Kerber, the VP of Underwriter Laboratories and Director of UL Fire Safety Research Institute, and Dr Craig Weinschenk, research engin…
035 - Fire safety as cornerstone of sustainability with Margaret McNamee
Jan. 26, 2022
Building a fire-safe future is not an easy task. Including sustainability in that build, is even harder. But how hard is it to include fire safety in the discussion, when sustainability itself is a goal? Does sustainability …
034 - Fire safety as a human right, not a privilege with Danielle Antonellis
Jan. 19, 2022
There are topics in fire science that gain more attention than others. Timber in fire. Batteries. Facades. They are novel, complex, challenging and yet as engineers, we must handle them in our everyday job. But are they impo…
033 - Science, theatre or engineering? Polish take on hot smoke test with Piotr Smardz and Janusz Paliszek
Jan. 12, 2022
Have you ever heard about the hot smoke testing approach? If you had, there is a great chance you have not heard anything positive about it... From our experience, this method is often downplayed as useless, unrealistic and …
032 - Closing the year with a look back on 2021 and forward to the future!
Dec. 22, 2021
Welcome to the final episode of this year! I hope you all had a great year. For me, it was probably the most challenging, and the most rewarding year of my whole professional career. Join me in this episode recollecting the …
031 - Suppressing tunnel fires with water mist with Johny Jessen
Dec. 15, 2021
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…
030 - Visibility Prediction Framework with Lukas Arnold
Dec. 8, 2021
If you ever had anything to do with Fire Safety Engineering, you have most likely touched the visibility in smoke. What's an easier way to explain how bad the conditions are inside of a building than saying how much smoke wa…
029 -Busses, flammability and an unknown force holding good solutions back... with Anja Hofmann-Böllinghaus
Dec. 1, 2021
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…
028 - Easy entry into the world of AI in fire with MZ Naser
Nov. 24, 2021
Have you ever been fascinated by the capabilities of AI? Did you wonder how the heck can an algorithm beat humans in repetitive tasks? Or make multi-level correlations that we would never be able to figure out? I was as well…
027 - Travelling fires with Guillermo Rein
Nov. 17, 2021
If you have ever learned about the compartment fire dynamics framework, have tried zone modelling or any kind of fire modelling, you have probably noticed that as the compartments get bigger, the less uniform conditions insi…
026 - Field report from IWMA conference in Warsaw
Nov. 10, 2021
Thanks to the courtesy of the International Water Mist Association I have been invited to the recent conference held in Warsaw. The conference was a two-day event focused on water mist technology. In fact, it was the 20th me…
025 - Structural fire engineering with engineered timber with Felix Wiesner
Nov. 3, 2021
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 …
024 - Who's a Fire Safety Engineer with Jimmy Jönsson
Oct. 27, 2021
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…
023 - Risk assessment with Maximum Allowable Damage with Jaime Cadena Gomez and David Lange
Oct. 20, 2021
Risk as a concept is well established in modern Performance-Based Design in Fire Safety Engineering. However, it comes in many flavours - from a simple calculation of consequences vs probability, through indexing methods and…
022 - Combustion, fluid mechanics and fire safety engineering with Michael Gollner
Oct. 13, 2021
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…
021 - Resilient design for firefighter safety with Ali Ashrafi
Oct. 5, 2021
It is hard for us, fire safety engineers, to talk to firefighters on how to do their job... Probably we even shouldn't, as we have no idea how it is to truly go there into the heat and battle fire to save lives. But it does …
020 - Fire Safety Engineering as a socio-technical system with Brian Meacham
Sept. 29, 2021
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…
019 - Modelling human behaviour in wildfire evacuation with Erica Kuligowski
Sept. 21, 2021
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…
018 - Engineered timber with Danny Hopkin
Sept. 15, 2021
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 …
017 - Pyrolife - from fire resistance to fire resilience with Cathelijne Stoof
Sept. 8, 2021
When you think about battling wildfires, what is the image you see in front of your eyes? Probably an air tanker (at least that was what I saw...). After this interview, your optics will change about 180 degrees. Dr Cathelij…
016 - The future of evacuation modelling with Enrico Ronchi and Ruggiero Lovreglio
Sept. 1, 2021
Evacuation modelling is paramount in accounting for the human aspect in our fire modelling. But how is it developing? Where are we with our tools, and where are we heading with them? What are the most profound challenges rel…
015 - Global view on the fire safety from a starchitect perpective with Benjamin Ralph
Aug. 25, 2021
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…
014 - A joyrney through the scales of fire phenomena with Sara McAllister
Aug. 18, 2021
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 …