External Fire Spread Risk in Tall Building Design

Congratulations to our Managing Director, Mr. Faimeen Shah on successfully completing the External Fire Spread Risk in Tall Building Design CPD course at The University of Queensland in Brisbane Australia. This specialised and focussed course was developed in close collaboration between:

• The University of Queensland (Australia);
• The University of Edinburgh (UK); and
• The University of Maryland (USA).

The purpose of this course was to provide practising chartered professional fire engineers with the specialist knowledge to address the fire safety strategy of buildings and understand the implications of using cladding products capable of supporting vertical flame spread. The provision of design solutions for buildings requires competent fire engineers with the understanding of the key fundamental processes regarding the fire safety strategy, cladding design, and the interactions between the cladding of a façade and the building in the event of a fire.

The course used a combination of lectures, laboratory sessions, and case studies to deliver a comprehensive review of the fire safety strategy, the fire performance of cladding systems, and the implications of potentially combustible cladding products such as aluminium composite panels (ACP) or insulation materials to the fire safety strategy of buildings.

Vortex Fire in the capacity of House of Expertise (HOE) with Dubai Civil Defence (DCD) and experienced chartered professional fire engineers in our Canberra, Dubai, Sydney and Toronto office offer the following specialist façade fire assessment services:

• Explicitly define and describe the fire safety strategy for a given building in the context of external fire spread;
• Interpret the inherent links and interdependence of fire safety systems and phenomena with respect to code based solutions and external fire spread;
• Describe the fire dynamics and fluid dynamics behind vertical fire growth;
• Recognise the distinction between construction typologies with respect to the fundamental phenomena that control fire spread;
• Comprehend the mechanical behaviours that are relevant to external fire spread in common cladding typologies;
• Create fire safety engineering solutions that explicitly link the governing phenomena of vertical fire spread, common cladding typologies, and the fire safety strategy.

For more information or assistance on any your existing projects, please contact us.