Flames venting externally during full-scale flashover fires: two sample ventilation cases
✍ Scribed by S. Klopovic; Ö.F. Turan
- Publisher
- Elsevier Science
- Year
- 1998
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 425 KB
- Volume
- 31
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0379-7112
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✦ Synopsis
The effects of burn room ventilation and environmental conditions on venting plumes have been examined during a series of full-scale flashover fires at the Experimental Building Fire Facility of CESARE (Centre for Environmental Safety and Risk Engineering) of Victoria University of Technology. The focus in this paper is on two typical test cases, each corresponding to one of the two ventilation classes examined during this series of fires, namely, Class 1: through-draft (flow through) and Class 2: no-through-draft conditions. These conditions correspond to the open door and window in the burn room, and the closed door and open window, respectively. Three-dimensional temperature contours outside the burn room have been used to study plume dispersion. Total and radiant heat flux measurements, combined with the overall reach and severity of venting flames indicate that flames emerging from the room of fire origin are capable of initiating a secondary fire in the level above. While each fire has a natural periodicity innate to the combustion process itself, any swirling motion of the venting plume has been observed to be caused by a cross-wind.