Some Neglected Areas in Fire Safety Engineering

Fire safety engineering has developed remarkably well over the last 4 decades, yet there are certain areas that have been systematically neglected or overlooked. On the basis of his long career in the profession, the author offers a number of areas for consideration where improvements are still clearly needed. These include: (1) learning from fire incidents in a systematic way; (2) studying fires in residential houses; (3) collecting statistics which are meaningful; (4) developing cost-effective codes and standards; and (5) considering the unintended consequences of fire safety provisions. Issues in each of these areas are illustrated with concrete examples.