The development of travelling fire methodology and industrial application

Many studies of large compartments in fire carried out over the past two decades show that fires in such compartments have a great deal of non-uniformity, unlike the homogeneous compartment temperature assumption commonly made in the current fire safety engineering practice. In general, large compartment fires burn locally and tend to move across entire floor plates over a period of time, characterised as “travelling fire”. An extended travelling fire method (ETFM) framework has been implemented in SIFBuilder, a comprehensive tool with high computational efficiency. Case study results are presented demonstrating the new capabilities for generalised fire structure coupling.

This short presentation will also introduce two Research For Coal and Steel (RFCS) projects in which ArcelorMittal Global R&D is involved : LOCAFI+ (Temperature assessment of a vertical steel member subjected to localised fire) and TRAFIR (Characterization of travelling fires in large compartments). Research and Development is a key field in our industry. The Structural Applications department from the Luxembourg Research Centre is mainly involved in: a) development of new applications, new products and technical solutions to facilitate the use of steel in construction; b) development of user-friendly software for pre-design dedicated to engineering offices and architects; c) development and modifications of international codes for the easier use of steel; and d) dissemination of knowledge by application to real buildings through partnerships with engineering offices and architects.