Unusual Fire in Open and Confined Space

A special issue of Fire (ISSN 2571-6255). This special issue belongs to the section "Fire Risk Assessment and Safety Management in Buildings and Urban Spaces".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 July 2024 | Viewed by 4902

Special Issue Editors

School of Civil Engineering, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei 230009, China
Interests: unusual fire in open space; spilling fire; gas explosion suppression; flame spread; biomass; hydrogen safety; FCI in nuclear industry industrial; petrochemical industry

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Guest Editor
School of Safety Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou 221000, China
Interests: fire safety in underground space; high-rise building fire; fire risk evaluation of critical infrastructures; structural fire resistant design

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Unusual fires occur occasionally in open environments or confined spaces in buildings and ships. Unusual fires in open spaces mainly include jet flames from gas leakage, boilover and spilling fire from liquid leakage, extreme wildfires in forests, and accidental ignition of fuel on water or ice surfaces. Meanwhile, unusual fires in confined spaces include ghosting fires, backdraft fires, flashover fires, fire whirlwinds, and wind-aided fires. Compared with that of common pool fires and wood crib fires, the knowledge of unusual fires is insufficient. Therefore, it is of great significance to study these unusual fire behaviors to reduce fire hazards.

In this Special Issue for Fire, which is indexed in the Science Citation Index and in Scopus, we welcome the submission of articles related to unusual fire behaviors, such as ghosting fires, backdraft fires, flashover fires, fire whirlwinds in confined spaces, and jet fires, boilover, spilling fires, extreme wildfires, and fires on water or ice surfaces in open spaces. This Special Issue aims to highlight safety in the treatment of unusual fires in open and confined spaces. In this Special Issue, the scope is to gather original, fundamental, and applied research comprising experimental, theoretical, computational, and case study approaches that contribute to the understanding of flame spread and unusual fires. Original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

  • mechanisms of the occurrence of unusual fires;
  • prevention of unusual fires;
  • flame plume of unusual fires in open space;
  • fire-induced smoke movement in confined spaces;
  • modeling and simulation of unusual fires.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Manhou Li
Prof. Dr. Weiguang An
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Fire is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • jet fire
  • boilover of heavy oil
  • liquid spilling fire
  • fire on water or ice surface
  • compartment ghosting fire
  • compartment backdraft fire
  • compartment flashover fire
  • fire whirlwind in confined space
  • wind-aided fire

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

13 pages, 4090 KiB  
Article
Experimental and Theoretical Investigation of Longitudinal Temperature Attenuation and Smoke Movement in Urban Utility Tunnel Fires
by Biteng Cao, Hong Liu, Rui Fan, Xiaoyu Ju and Lizhong Yang
Fire 2024, 7(4), 123; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire7040123 - 08 Apr 2024
Viewed by 391
Abstract
The urban utility tunnel is an indispensable part of modern engineering construction. However, the fire risk cannot be ignored due to the narrow space and limited ventilation of the utility tunnel. A study of smoke filling is performed in a 1/8-scaled utility tunnel [...] Read more.
The urban utility tunnel is an indispensable part of modern engineering construction. However, the fire risk cannot be ignored due to the narrow space and limited ventilation of the utility tunnel. A study of smoke filling is performed in a 1/8-scaled utility tunnel (25 m × 0.5 m × 0.45 m). Five heat release rates (5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 kW) and four positions of fire sources are used for tests. The initial position of the one-dimensional smoke movement of strong plume is determined. Based on the traditional model, the longitudinal temperature attenuation model of tunnel smoke is established with consideration of radiation and convection heat losses. The theoretical value of the longitudinal temperature rise of smoke is in good agreement with the experimental value. A one-dimensional spreading velocity model is established that coincides well with the experimental value, and the relative error is less than 20%. The spreading velocity of smoke is increased by the heat release rate. The velocity of the smoke spreading at the near end is smaller than that at the center, due to the long spreading route. The current conclusions disclosed in this study provide important guidance for the ventilation design of utility tunnels for fire smoke scenarios. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Unusual Fire in Open and Confined Space)
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21 pages, 6706 KiB  
Article
Structural Performance of Outdoor Mechanical Garages under Combustion Conditions
by Yin Zhang, Zuocai Wang, Yang Li, Hongsheng Ma and Zhan Guo
Fire 2024, 7(4), 116; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire7040116 - 02 Apr 2024
Viewed by 447
Abstract
In this paper, the firing process and structural failure behavior of outdoor mechanical car parks are innovatively investigated under diverse conditions, leveraging fire experiments, FDS fire simulation, and finite element simulation. The fire experiments reveal the intricate interplay between flame spread and airflow, [...] Read more.
In this paper, the firing process and structural failure behavior of outdoor mechanical car parks are innovatively investigated under diverse conditions, leveraging fire experiments, FDS fire simulation, and finite element simulation. The fire experiments reveal the intricate interplay between flame spread and airflow, highlighting the enhanced risk of fire propagation among adjacent spaces. The temperature profile, mirroring the fire’s lifecycle, is delineated into three distinct stages: initial growth, full development, and eventual decay. Notably, full-scale fire simulation in FDS validates the experimental outcomes, underscoring the scalability and reliability of our scaled-down experiments. Furthermore, finite element simulations offer a profound understanding of structural safety in various parking spaces during a fire. Critically, the susceptibility of columns to failure underscores the imperative need for enhanced fire prevention measures in column design, representing a significant advancement in fire protection engineering. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Unusual Fire in Open and Confined Space)
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12 pages, 11345 KiB  
Article
Simulation Test on Cooling and Fire Suppression with Liquid Nitrogen in Computer Room of Data Center
by Jianbing Meng, Tingrong Wang, Guanghua Li and Jianhong Kang
Fire 2023, 6(3), 116; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire6030116 - 13 Mar 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1432
Abstract
With the rapid development of worldwide computer data center construction, the reliability requirements of the fire-fighting system for data center rooms are also increasing. By using the self-designed simulation platform of liquid nitrogen spray, this paper studies the liquid nitrogen cooling process in [...] Read more.
With the rapid development of worldwide computer data center construction, the reliability requirements of the fire-fighting system for data center rooms are also increasing. By using the self-designed simulation platform of liquid nitrogen spray, this paper studies the liquid nitrogen cooling process in the initial heating stage of a computer data center room fire and the liquid nitrogen extinguishing effects for common combustible materials, revealing the feasibility of applying liquid nitrogen to the fire extinguishing system for data center room. The results show that the cooling and inerting effects with quarter sector fan-shaped 6520 spray nozzle are the best among seven types of spray nozzles, the relative temperature changes by more than 50% within 5 min, and the oxygen concentration in the test space drops below 10%. Compared with optical fiber, the ignition range of uninterruptible power supply com-bination during combustion is relatively small. Liquid nitrogen has a significant fire-extinguishing effect on two combustible materials, which can successfully extinguish optical fiber and UPS within 3 min and 2 min, respectively. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Unusual Fire in Open and Confined Space)
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13 pages, 3614 KiB  
Article
Study on Pyrolysis Characteristics of Chinese Fir under Different Natural Aging Times
by Huailin Yan, Guoqing Zhu and Yongchang Zhao
Fire 2022, 5(5), 161; https://doi.org/10.3390/fire5050161 - 06 Oct 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1296
Abstract
The thermal degradation behavior of naturally aging Chinese fir was investigated using a STA 449 thermal analyzer. The Chinese fir with different natural aging times showed different pyrolysis behaviors. The longer the natural aging time, the lower the initial pyrolysis temperature of Chinese [...] Read more.
The thermal degradation behavior of naturally aging Chinese fir was investigated using a STA 449 thermal analyzer. The Chinese fir with different natural aging times showed different pyrolysis behaviors. The longer the natural aging time, the lower the initial pyrolysis temperature of Chinese fir. The results of activation energy estimated by Kissinger–Akahira–Sunose (KAS) method and Flynn–Wall–Ozawa (FWO) method are almost the same. However, with the increase in natural aging time, the activation energy of fir is increasing. The suitable pyrolysis reaction model of nature aging—10 Chinese fir was attributed to the ‘‘diffusion-Jander’’ (D3) model. Furthermore, a nth order reaction model serves for nature aging—70 and nature aging—100 Chinese fir reaction mechanism. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Unusual Fire in Open and Confined Space)
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