A system for the analysis of fire reports, and its application to health care buildings

A system of analysing fire reports is described, which evaluates the success of failure of the building elements and occupants in mitigating the consequencies of ignition. To handle fire reports a method of categorising the fire growth sequence in terms of both flame and smoke spread was developed. Three tactics (ignition prevention, fire control and evacuation) which mitigate the consequencies of ignition were derived from a hierarchy of fire safety and their interrelationship was examined. The application of this analysis method to two sets of the reports of fires in health buildings was undertaken and its success validated the proposed methodology.