Fire risk in high-rise and super high-rise buildings DG 533

BRE (Building Research Establishment) is an independent, research-based consultancy, testing and training organisation, operating in the built environment and associated industries.

Ensuring high-rise buildings are safe presents a number of challenges. For example, there is no standard definition of what a high-rise building is. Traditionally, in the context of fire, high-rise buildings have been considered to be buildings high enough that a fire cannot be fought using standard firefighting methods. As a result, there are significant differences to the fire safety measures required in high-rise buildings. These related to; the number of occupants high above the ground, the possible adoption of a phased evacuation strategy or a ‘defend in place’ strategy, the length of time needed to evacuate and so on.

Fire risk in high-rise and super high-rise buildings: Prevention and mitigation (DG 533) was written by David Charters, Roisin Cullinan and Emma Warren, and published by BRE on 21 August 2014.

The 12-page digest provides guidance about the nature of fire risk in high-rise and super high-rise buildings and how it can assessed and mitigated. It reviews a number of fires in high-rise buildings and presents theoretical and quantitative analysis of fire risks.

The digest is intended for designers (such as architects and engineers), approval authorities (such as building control bodies and fire officers), as well as the owners, operators and insurers of high-rise buildings.

The contents of the digest include:

• Introduction.
• The nature of high-rise buildings.
• Existing guidance for fire safety in high-rise buildings.
• Fire events in high-rise buildings.
• Examples of high-rise building fire events.
• One Meridian Plaza, Philadelphia, 1991.
• World Trade Center, New York, 2001.
• Cook County Administration Building, Chicago, 2003.
• Windsor Tower Fire, Madrid, 2005.
• Analysis of fire risks in high-rise buildings.
• Risk as a function of the height of a building.
• Analysis of fire statistics.
• Computer model for fire risk in high-rise buildings.
• Results of analysis.
• Findings and conclusions.
• References.

--BRE Group

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