Determination of Appropriate Operation of Firefighting Facility using Fire and Evacuation Simulations

Abstract

Recently, a performance-based design of a fire protection facility has been proposed that significantly contributes to the construction of safe and reliable buildings. Improving the performance of the fire protection facility will enable protection of the public along with the infrastructure. Designs focusing on the fire protection performance generally add or modify architectural aspects through fire and evacuation simulations. However, a secure evacuation system aided with CCTVs has rarely been considered as an active system. Particularly for apartments, it is very difficult to assure evacuation safety without using an active system in fire and evacuation simulations with the front door of the burning room open. Safety can be achieved by combining a passive system with an active system, on the basis that the building premises has the foundation of a passive system. The regulation on the evacuation delay time in the nation was brought in effect through the SFPE paper but was deleted since the data reliability was insufficient. Therefore, the aim of the present study is to analyze the operation of a fire protection facility required to ensure safety by planning multiple simulations of a fire and evacuation system. An apartment has been considered as an example to design the foundation for a standard evacuation safety system. An active system is applied to execute fire and evacuation simulations, with focus on the fire protection performance.