Fire Science Show

In this episode of the Fire Science Show we invite dr. Antonela Čolić from the OFR Consultants, to break down the performance of adhesives used in CLT in fire, what differences between the glues are observable at the microscale  and how they show up in real structure fires. We compare common polyurethane adhesives: one that softens near 200–220 C and one that resists softening, crosslinks, and ult...

In this episode we try to demonstrate another step in integrating fire engineering into WUI risk management, and vice versa. These two areas together form some sort of fire engineering method, which I strongly believe will be an important part of our profession in the future. Today I got to sit down with Dr. Pascale Vacca from UPC to unpack a practical, end-to-end framework for wildland–urban inte...

Fire doesn’t play by Earth’s rules once you leave gravity behind. In this deep dive with Professor Michael Gollner, we unpack what the recent experiments at the ISS called SoFIE-MIST taught us about solid fuel flammability in microgravity—how tiny ventilation, oxygen levels, and pressure shifts determine whether a flame spreads, stalls, or vanishes. The details are surprising: blue “bubble” flames...

In this episode we dive into the ap between standardized tests and experiments, trying to figure out (a) is there a difference and (b) if there is, could not understanding the difference quietly erode safety. With guest David Morrisset (Queensland University), we unpack furnace ratings that read like time but aren’t, cladding classifications that were never meant for façades, and the infamous bird...

In this episode, we give focus to the SFPE Foundation – a catalyst transforming how fire engineering research is funded, conducted, and shared globally. In this conversation with Leslie Marshall, Interim Executive Director of the SFPE Foundation, we discover how a relatively small organization has distributed over $1.2 million in grants, scholarships, and research funding since 2021. While the Fou...

What happens when the flames die down? It's a question rarely addressed in fire engineering, yet the decay and cooling phases of fires can be more dangerous than peak fire conditions. In this deep-dive conversation with Dr. Andrea Lucherini from Frisbee at ZAG in Slovenia, we uncover why these overlooked phases matter profoundly for structural safety. Most engineers focus on protecting struct...

In my personal view, an alarming truth about building fire safety lies in the gap between what's designed and what actually works in a building. After conducting 1000+ hot smoke tests in 200+ buildings, my experience is that most (maybe even 90%) of buildings had deficiencies in their smoke control systems, with 30% experiencing issues significant enough to potentially endanger occupants duri...

What happens when we stick a thermocouple into a fire? The answer is surprisingly complex and has profound implications for fire safety engineering. In this deep-dive episode, Dr. David Morrisset from Queensland University joins Wojciech to unravel the science of fire measurements that underpins every experiment, test report, and dataset in our field. The conversation reveals a critical truth ofte...

The devastating 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California serves as a haunting reminder of how rapidly wildfires can overwhelm communities. We have not known anything like it - the flames raced through Paradise at four miles per hour, 30,000 residents had mere minutes to evacuate, and many couldn't escape in time. What happens when the fire goes worse than worst case scenario, but still people n...

The world looks entirely different through a thermal camera lens, especially in a fire scenario. These devices reveal harsh temperature gradients between hot and cold surfaces, adding another dimension to how fire safety professionals understand and navigate dangerous environments. Thermal cameras have transformed firefighting operations with astonishing effectiveness. Studies show that in smoke-f...

The AI revolution has arrived, but fire safety engineers face a critical dilemma: how to leverage powerful AI tools while protecting confidential project data.  Professor Ruggiero Rino Lovreglio from Massey University and Dr. Amir Rafe from Utah State University join us to explore the world of local Large Language Models (LLMs) - AI systems you can run privately on your own computer without sendin...

When experts from different disciplines attempt to collaborate on complex problems, such as evacuation modelling, we often discover that we're not speaking the same language. Even seemingly simple terms like "density," "velocity," and "distance" carry dramatically different meanings across physics, psychology, engineering, and computer science. In this episode, w...

In episode 17 of the Fire Fundamentals, we delve into the fire detection technology. Fire detection forms the critical foundation of all active fire protection measures, serving as the prerequisite for any fire safety engineering solution to work effectively. Following key points are discussed: Detection systems must balance sensitivity with reliability to avoid false alarms that disrupt building...

In the 16th part of the Fire Fundamentals series, we invite Randy McDermott from NIST to join us for a deep dive into turbulence and its critical role in fire dynamics modelling. We explore the physics behind turbulent combustion and how it fundamentally shapes fire behaviour, plume dynamics, and simulation accuracy. In this episode we cover: Defining turbulence as the enhancement of mixing and he...

In this podcast episode, I invited Chris Jelenewicz, the CEO of SFPE, to bring me up to date on the society. The SFPE Handbook on Fire Protection Engineering is undergoing a major revision with the sixth edition expected by summer's end, expanding to five volumes with significant new content on emerging topics like wildland fires and lithium-ion batteries. In this episode, we cover how the ha...

Water might seem like the simplest part of firefighting – just point and spray, right? Well, as you can imagine, the reality is a bit more complex. In this conversation with veteran firefighter and CFBT instructor Szymon Kokot, we pull back the curtain on firefighting's most critical resource to reveal the intricate science and logistics behind effective fire suppression. Did you know a stand...

As a consequence of the Grenfell Tower disaster, some strong legislation was proposed, such as a combustible ban on building walls. This, however, affected more than just the building facades, as it excluded materials such as laminated glass used as balcony balustrades.  Today, the path forward demands evidence that could inform decisions on the future of laminated glass in this use. In this conve...

Today I'm taking you for a sightseeing trip to see what fire safety looks like beyond our usual office, residential buildings and car parks. Fire engineering takes on an entirely different dimension when applied to massive infrastructure projects where conventional building codes provide minimal guidance and engineers must forge their own path. Dr. Mukesh Tomar from Jacobs takes us deep into...

Dr Randy McDermott takes us behind the scenes of fire science's most critical software tool in this conversation about the Fire Dynamic Simulator (FDS) developed at NIST. As one of the developers, Randy offers valuable insights into how this essential modelling tool is maintained, improved, and adapted to meet the evolving challenges of the fire safety community. The conversation begins with...

Four years ago, what began as a mission to preserve valuable fire safety engineering conversations has grown into a fairly large platform connecting professionals across 170+ countries. The journey to 200 episodes and nearly 200,000 downloads has been both challenging and deeply rewarding – in this episode, I share a bit about my journey, the state of things and the near future of the podcast.  **...

I've finally done it. We've repeated Jin's experiment! I thought I knew-it-all about that experiment, but boy... knowing and doing it are two different things. I can say, I've finally cleared my mind on some thoughts after this, which I am finally happy to share with all of you! First things first, massive thanks to my partner in crime Wai-Kit Wilson Cheung, from the group of p...

The gap between fire safety engineering and firefighting operations creates a profound challenge that affects building safety worldwide. Even experienced fire safety engineers - myself included - face uncertainty when designing for firefighters without being firefighters themselves. Yet many building codes explicitly require engineers to account for firefighting operations in their designs. This e...

What happens when a lifetime of studying industrial fire hazards meets the creative mind of a novelist? In this conversation with Professor Joaquim Casal, we explore the unique intersection of fire safety engineering and science fiction through his novel "The Last Fire." Professor Casal, a retired academic from Universitat Politécnica Catalunya and founder of their fire research group, h...

Episode 200! And for this special episode,  I've travelled to London to interview Prof. Guillermo Rein and Dr Matt Bonner on a piece of research carried out at Imperial College London, with the experiments performed in our laboratory at the ITB. In this episode, we discuss the concept of flammability of the building facades and how this flammability is assessed with different testing methods...

We know a whole lot more about mass timber in fire than we did a few years ago (even when I’ve just started the podcast 199 episodes back …). But is this knowledge widely used in engineering practice? Is it used in the same way by different stakeholders? Definitely not. This is why to move timber into something we would consider “new normal”, we need more than research. We need a consensus on how...