Summary of the 12th International Symposium on Fire Safety Science

The Division of Fire Safety Engineering at Lund University hosted the 12th International Symposium on Fire Safety Science on June 10 to June 16. The Symposium was a success in regards to the quality of the papers and posters presented. Furthermore, a record number of participants (> 470) from all continents except Antarctica were present.

The Symposium is the premier fire safety science meeting in the world and has been organized triennially since 1985 by the IAFSS. The program included presentations of more than 119 papers, including ten invited papers that had undergone a full peer review.

The papers were presented in the following seven streams: Material Behavior in Fires (18 papers), Fire Dynamics (26 papers), Structures in Fire (10 papers), Fire Suppression (17 papers), Wildland Fires (17 papers), Evacuation and Human Behavior (9 papers), and papers addressing Additional Topics in Fire Safety (12 papers). The papers are now published as a Special Issue of the Fire Safety Journal that can be accessed online. (Free access for current IAFSS members here.)

In addition to the published papers, a total of 136 posters and a wide selection of fire and combustion images were presented during the Symposium.

The Symposium also featured several workshops on the weekend prior to the Symposium. The IAFSS Working Group on Measurement and Computation of Fire Phenomena organized a one and half day long workshop with focus on experimental validation of CFD-based fire models. Workshops on Quantification of Fire Effluent Toxicity, Large Outdoor Fires and the Built Environment, New approaches to evacuation modelling, Global perspectives of Timber in high-rise buildings and Better Linking Fire Safety Science and Fire Safety Engineering were also organized. All the workshops were fully booked. For the first time there was also a workshop on equal opportunities workshop and women in fire safety science held during the Symposium.

The Symposium was held on the Faculty of Engineering campus at Lund University just a 15-minute walk from central Lund. The delegates enjoyed free public transportation during the Symposium and had the opportunity to see Lund and the surrounding areas. There were also several social activities organized. On the evening of the first symposium day the delegates could participate in a Swedish midsummer celebration at Kulturen in central Lund. The event started with a guided tour and a dance performance, and was followed by a traditional Swedish Midsummer dinner.

On Tuesday evening the delegates had the chance to see the MSB Revinge rescue service collage and training field during. Several of the large-scale laboratories and research experiments at Lund University are conducted at MSB Revinge.

The Symposium Awards Ceremony was held after the last session on Thursday. The awardees were presented with their awards in the University Aula located in the main University Building. The awards ceremony was follow by the Symposium Banquet, which included very nice three-course meal and high quality entrainment.

The local organisation committee is very honoured to have hosted this prestigious symposium and to receive so much positive feedback from the participants. The Symposium would not have been possible without the hard work of the staff at Division of Fire Safety Engineering and the volunteer students!

An image gallery from the symposium is available here, compliments of Michael Strömgren.

Signed:

Local organisation committee of the 12th International Symposium on Fire Safety Science