International Fire Engineering Guidelines and Fire Brigade Intervention Model - Robustness of a fire-engineered solution
Dear Australian Building Codes Board,
The International Fire Engineering Guidelines (version 2005) states the following on page 2.9 - 4:
The FBIM can be used as a whole or in part to generate information with respect to the following:
• The robustness of a fire-engineered solution.
However, on the second page of the Fire Brigade Intervention Model V2.2 October 2004 - Foreword there is a warning stating the following:
Conditions of release
• The software is a Beta version of the FBIM and has been released to enable review,
testing and improvement.
• The program may generate results, which contain errors of logic or precision.
• The software must be used in conjunction with The Fire Brigade Intervention Model
Manual V2.2 OCTOBER 2004
• This FBIM Manual and Software should only be used by suitably qualified and experienced fire service officers and fire safety engineers in line with fire brigade standard operational procedures.
• It is essential that the input and output parameters be reviewed by the relevant fire agency fire safety department.
• The FBIM does not detail all the engineering technology required for building fire safety design and should be conducted in relation to other fires safety sub systems.
• Users of the model shall be cognizant of the disclaimer contained within the FBIM User Manual.
Given the software is a Beta version which may generate results which contain errors of logic or precision and the FBIM does not detail all the engineering technology required for building fire safety design, please provide a copy the due diligence exercise/analysis (or similar) that the Australian Building Codes Board undertook to establish that the FBIM is suitable for establishing the robustness of a fire engineered solution, so that Australian consumers or members of the public have not been provided with any false or misleading representation as to the capability of the FBIM.
Please also supply the list of fire brigade operational procedures that the Australian Building Codes Board used as part of the validation/analysis exercise (or similar).
Yours faithfully,
Ms Jensen
Thank you for your email to the Freedom of Information section of the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science (the department).
We have received your email and will endeavour to respond to you as soon as possible.
Kind regards,
FOI team
Legal, Audit and Assurance Branch| Corporate Network
[email address]
———————————————————————
Department of Industry, Innovation and Science | www.industry.gov.au
Legal In Confidence - This transmission is intended only for the use of the addressee and may contain confidential or legally privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any use or dissemination of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this transmission in error, please notify me immediately by telephone and delete copies of this transmission together with any attachments.
Dear Ms Jensen,
Please find the attached correspondence in response to your Freedom of Information request below dated 6 March 2016.
Unfortunately, the department does not have possession of the requested documents. The relevant line area suggested that the following information may be of interest to you.
The robustness of a fire engineered solution may be described as a measure of the potential for a fire engineered solution to not fail. Robustness may be evaluated through sensitivity analysis in which fundamental fire safety measures, which in combination form a building fire safety system, are extracted from a proposed system. The modified system is then mathematically modelled in order to identify the contribution of the extracted measure to the overall performance of the system. If a specific fire safety measure is identified as being a potential source of system failure; it may be necessary to introduce a compensating fire safety measure in order to minimise the potential for systemic failure. A determination of the need for a compensating measure is typically influenced by the probability of failure of individual measures.
When developing certain Alternative Solutions, fire brigade intervention may be a matter for consideration by a building designer; however it is not a mandatory requirement of the NCC. In this context; while consideration of fire brigade intervention may be included in an assessment of the robustness of a fire engineered Alternative Solution, it would be expected to be deemed a redundant fire safety measure in a fire safety system.
The ‘Fire Brigade Intervention Model’ (FBIM) was developed by a ‘Performance Based Fire Engineering Committee’ established by the Australasian Fire Authorities Council (AFAC).
In essence, it is a model used by fire engineers to estimate the period of time it would take from the time the fire brigade receive automatic notification of a fire, to the time they set-up on-site and become ready to fight the fire. This time period is used to estimate the size of the fire they should expect to be facing when they arrive on-site, which is an important factor in facilitating safe fire brigade operations.
An outline of the FBIM is presented on the Metropolitan Fire and Emergency Services Board (Victoria) website http://www.mfb.vic.gov.au/media/docs/Gui... . This document advises that the FBIM was developed so that the functional role of a fire brigade can be effectively included in the building design process. The document also advises that the FBIM should be considered an appropriate tool when analysing the performance of a fire safety system against the Performance Requirements of the NCC.
In summary, the FBIM is a database presented as both a manual and computer software that was developed by the AFAC.
Kind regards,
FOI team
Legal, Audit and Assurance Branch| Corporate Network
[email address]
———————————————————————
Department of Industry, Innovation and Science | www.industry.gov.au
Legal In Confidence - This transmission is intended only for the use of the addressee and may contain confidential or legally privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any use or dissemination of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this transmission in error, please notify me immediately by telephone and delete copies of this transmission together with any attachments.