ANALYSIS OF ONTARIO FIRES AND RELIABILITY OF ACTIVE FIRE PROTECTION SYSTEMS by Chandra S. Juneja A thesis submitted to the faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Masters of Applied Science Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario © Chandra S. Juneja, 2004 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Library and Bibliotheque et 1*1 Archives Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de I'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Canada Canada Your file Votre reference ISBN: 0-494-00745-1 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 0-494-00745-1 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non­ L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives and Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans loan, distribute and sell theses le monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, worldwide, for commercial or non­ sur support microforme, papier, electronique commercial purposes, in microform, et/ou autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. this thesis. Neither the thesis Ni la these ni des extraits substantiels de nor substantial extracts from it celle-ci ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement may be printed or otherwise reproduits sans son autorisation. reproduced without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la loi canadienne Privacy Act some supporting sur la protection de la vie privee, forms may have been removed quelques formulaires secondaires from this thesis. ont ete enleves de cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires in the document page count, aient inclus dans la pagination, their removal does not represent il n'y aura aucun contenu manquant. any loss of content from the thesis. i * i Canada Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I take this opportunity to put on record my sincere thanks and deep gratitude to my thesis supervisor Professor George Hadjisophocleous, for his guidance, suggestions and valuable help extended to me in completion of this project. In spite of his very busy schedule while holding Canada’s first Industrial Research Chair in Fire Safety Engineering at Carleton University, he has always made sure to give me the needed time, to listen to me very patiently and to render his fullest co-operation. Without his support this project would not have been a reality. He has identified a challenging and satisfying thesis topic and provided valuable comments and feedback during various meetings which showed me the way to achieving my goal. I sincerely thank Dr. Jim Mehaffey for making time from his busy schedule and sharing his in-depth knowledge in the field of fire safety and for his valuable suggestions. I am thankful to my colleagues/classmates Dr Zhuman Fu, Mr. Derek Gruchy, Mr. Dominic Esposito, Mr. Sean Tracy, Mr. Ehab Zalok and Mr. Steven Craft for their valuable help and discussions that helped me in completing my work. I owe a special debt of gratitude and heartfelt thanks to my wife Shashi, who waited very patiently for so long and has always been a big inspiration as well as a great help at all times. I am very grateful to my most loving sons Mayank and Rohan who helped me a lot in making me learn a number of computer skills that helped me in a big way for completing my work. Not only that, my elder son encouraged me a lot and rendered all sorts of help in shaping this work. I acknowledge my deep sense of appreciation for my friends Enkenyelesh, Simran and Geeta for sparing their valuable time and helping me as and when needed. iii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Finally I would like to remember and pray to the almighty GOD who blessed me with the patience and courage to take up my studies after such a big gap of more than twenty five years. iv Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ABSTRACT As countries move towards the development and implementation of performance- based building codes, it is expected that there will be an increase in the use of scientific and engineering techniques and methods for the design of fire protection systems in buildings. Some of these calculation methods which evaluate the risk from fire to building occupants and contents require statistical data on the performance of active fire protection systems such as sprinklers and smoke detectors. This study aimed at obtaining reliability estimates for these systems using fire incident data from the Ontario Fire Marshal’s office. The study also analyzed the data to obtain the main causes and location of origin of fires in buildings, for all occupancies, and to see the impact of detectors and sprinkler systems on life safety and property damage. The performance of smoke detectors, heat detectors, and sprinkler systems was analyzed for various occupancies to obtain mean and 95% confidence limits of reliability. The findings show that operational reliability for these systems is lower than commonly used figures. The computer model DETACT was used to explore reasons for failure of sprinkler systems and heat detectors in some occupancies. v Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................1 2. LITERATURE REVIEW...............................................................................................5 2.1. Performance - based c o d es ..................................................................................................... 5 2.2. General statistical a n a l y s is ................................................................................................ 5 2.3. R eliability of sprinkler sy stem s ..........................................................................................7 2.4. N ew trends in fire protection ..............................................................................................20 2.5. Tr a de -o ffs...................................................................................................................................... 26 2.6. Su m m a r y .......................................................................................................................................... 28 3. STATISTICAL DATA..................................................................................................31 3.1. Introduction ..................................................................................................................................31 3.2. D escription of Ontario F ire M a r sh a l (OFM ) d a t a ..................................................32 3.2.1. Selected fires with loss 1995 to 2002................................................................33 3.2.2. Detection or Suppression Devices.................................................................... 35 3.2.3. Fatal fires structure and fire spread................................................................. 36 3.2.4. Fire fatalities ......................................................................................................37 3.2.5. Fire injuries.......................................................................................................39 4. STATISTICAL METHODS USED IN ANALYSIS....................................... 41 4.1. Introduction ..................................................................................................................................41 4.2. Statistical a n a l y sis ..................................................................................................................41 5. ANALYSIS OF ONTARIO FIRE DATA ...................................................................45 5.1 Fire loss trends , patterns , origins a n d causes of f ir e ........................................ 45 5.1.1 Fire losses...........................................................................................................46 5.1.2 Fire patterns by property classification.............................................................54 5.1.3 Origin o f fire.......................................................................................................60 5.1.3.1 Origin of fire for Assembly Occupancies ............................................................. 60 5.1.3.2 Origin of fire for Business and Personal Services Occupancies ...................64 5.1.3.3 Origin o f fire for Industrial Occupancies ...............................................................69 5.1.3.4 Origin o f fire for Institutional Occupancies ..........................................................74 5.1.3.5 Origin of fire for Mercantile Occupancies ...........................................................