Notice of Plans for IAFSS General Meeting, Part 2

Dear IAFSS Member,

I trust you are doing well. I am writing with information about the 2021 IAFSS General Meeting, Part 2, which will be held on 30 April 2021, 13:00 UTC.  The draft agenda for the meeting can be found here.

First, thank you to those who were able to join us on 24 March 2021 for Part 1 of the 2021 IAFSS General Meeting (GM).  This was our first ever virtual GM, and although we had a few minor glitches, the meeting went well. The draft minutes for the GM Part 1 are attached to the draft agenda for the GM Part 2.  As you will see, the proposed amendments to the Rules of the Association were approved, which formally allows us to proceed with a virtual GM Part 2. Click here to view the Rules of the Association.

As previously noted, we are changing the procedures for the GM Part 2, taking into account lessons learned and experiences gained from the GM Part 1, and aiming for a more interactive meeting.

  • To limit the potential for non-members to join the meeting, all eligible members will be required to pre-register to attend the meeting. You will need to contact the Secretariat to pre-register. Upon verification of eligibility, you will be sent a meeting link and password.
     
  • To assist us in checking attendees against our membership list, when logging into the meeting, please enter using your name in English as it correlates to your membership application.
     
  • Since the meeting time is limited, please try to log in five (5) minutes prior to the start of the GM. Please check your hardware and connections prior to the meeting time.
     
  • As with the GM Part 1, we are aiming to have any action required for voting to be presented in a form that votes can be simple ‘approve / disapprove / abstain’ where possible.  This is largely driven by the limited time for discussion and the time allotted for the meeting.
     
  • In the case where there is a vote that requires a choice between options (for example, if there are three candidates for Scrutineer and only two positions available), each option will be voted on separately, and the options receiving the highest vote counts will be taken as approved.
     
  • Details of actions requiring votes, as initiated by the Committee, will be posted to the IAFSS website by 17 April for review, and as appropriate, to allow time to submit proxy votes by members who cannot attend the 30 April meeting. It is expected that this will include:
     
    • Approval of past minutes of General Meetings of the Association (14 June 2017 and 24 March 2021)
    • Approval of the Treasurer’s report
    • Nominees for Honorary Auditors of the Association (two positions)
    • Nominees for Scrutineers of the Association (two positions)
       
  • Because time for discussion in the virtual GM Part 2 will be limited, any member who nominates members for the position of Honorary Auditor or Scrutineer, or proposes any action that will require a vote, or wishes to raise an item for discussion under Any Other Business, must provide text of the item in writing to the Honorary Secretary no later than 13 April 2021. This is to allow time for review, confirmation, and posting of the item by 17 April, and if needed, time to permit submittal of proxy votes by members who cannot attend. 
     
  • Due to time limitations, a maximum of five (5) minutes will be allotted for questions / discussion on any agenda item.
     
  • Proxy voting forms, for those unable to attend, will be available on 17 April, once items for voting have been identified and confirmed.  Note that it is intended to simplify the proxy form such that proxy votes will be given to the Honorary Secretary, unless another person is specifically designated. If another person is designated, confirmation is required from the designee, in advance of the GM, that they (a) agree to serve as proxy and (b) confirm that they will be in attendance at the meeting.  This is to help assure that the proxy vote will be delivered and counted appropriately.

As a member, your participation in General Meetings and your vote on issues of importance to the Association is critically important.  We ask that all who can attend and participate do so.  For those unable to attend, and who would like to exercise their right to vote, you are asked to provide your proxy vote to the Honorary Secretary no later than 27 April.

Also, we appreciate that options for voting and discussion remain somewhat limited. However, we have presented a more flexible and participative arrangement for Part 2 of the GM, within the limitations of time and technology being used. Developing a more robust on-line GM approach for future meetings will be an action on the Committee going forward.

Again, thank you for your understanding and flexibility, and if you have questions for clarification, or comments on what has been proposed, please let me know. Thank you.

Respectfully submitted,

Brian Meacham
IAFSS Honorary Secretary ad interim

Call for submissions for and Image Gallery entitled “Diversity in Fire Safety Science”

We would like to embrace the diversity of fire safety at the 13th IAFSS Symposium. As one initiative, we are delighted to announce the introduction of an Image Gallery highlighting “Diversity in Fire Safety Science” at the 13th IAFSS Symposium.  “Diversity” in this context could mean topics, team members, or any uniqueness in your research that relates to equity, diversity and inclusivity of all. For this, we are collecting images from members of IAFSS and participants at the 13th Symposium. These will be assembled into a display on the virtual Symposium platform as one way to embrace and profile our diversity!

Instructions

  • Send us an image of “Diversity” from your organization/group/company/research
  • Size: 16:9 (33.867 cm x 19.05 cm) – high definition is best as it can be adjusted if needed
  • Format: powerpoint slide or pdf
  • One slide per each organization/group/company
  • Get permission first if any individuals’ faces are shown in your slide (IAFSS will not be responsible for this)

Please note: submitted images will be used only for Image Gallery of “Diversity in Fire Safety Science” during the 13th IAFSS symposium.

Please submit your slide by April 1st to https://www.dropbox.com/request/4Ph1CE2E9MtHTGLWTHTx

Any questions/comments are welcome, please contact us (anne.steen.hansen@risefr.no, beth.weckman@uwaterloo.ca, izabella.m.vermesi@gmail.com, sayakas@fri.go.jp) any time.

Best Regards,

Diversity task group (Anne, Beth, Iza, and Sayaka)

Call for bids to organize & host the 15th IAFSS Symposium, Europe, 2026

The IAFSS Committee welcome bids for the 15th IAFSS Symposium, to be held in Europe in 2026.
Selection of the host for the symposium will be made by the new Management Committee at its April meeting, which will be associated with the virtual 13th IAFSS Symposium organized and hosted by the University of Waterloo. An exact date will be defined and communicated by those sending in a bid.
If you are interested in hosting the 15th IAFSS Symposium please click here for further information.

13th IAFSS Symposium Poster Deadline – January 30

Poster submissions have re-opened on Easy Chair for the 13th IAFSS Symposium. Final poster submission (NEW contributions): January 30, 2021. Read more here: https://uwaterloo.ca/international-symposium-on-fire-safety-science/

In light of developments related to the coronavirus (COVID-19), and the need to protect our own and extended communities, the Symposium Planning Committee, in consultation with the IAFSS Executive and Management Committees, has decided that the 13th IAFSS Symposium will be an on-line event. Further information can be found on the FAQ webpage.

Workshop to define a Fire Safety Mission for Europe

The IAFSS recently hosted a meeting in Brussels to define a Fire Safety Mission for Europe. A summary of the workshop and presentations are now available!

Workshop presentations

WHERE WE ARE COMING FROM?

WHERE ARE WE HEADED?

WHY A FIRE SAFETY MISSION – STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVES?

  • Funding Agency: Björn Sundström, Chairman of the Board, Brandforsk
  • Fire Fighter: Pieter Maes, Brussels Fire Department
  • Fire Engineer: Brian Meacham, President-Elect, SFPE
  • Academia: Guillermo Rein, Imperial College
  • Industry: Jonathan Crozier, pinfa and Quentin deHults, Modern Building Alliance (MBA)

IAFSS Workshop: Agenda 2030 for a Fire Safe World

The IAFSS will be holding a workshop on the afternoon of Tuesday, 11 September, just ahead of the ESFSS in Nancy, France.

Although great strides have been made in reducing the negative impacts of fire over the past few decades, the global impact of fire remains staggering. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates global burn deaths to 180,000 annually, the vast majority of these in low and middle-income countries. Within Europe, more than 3,500 people are killed annually. The losses in the USA are similar. In most developed countries the cost of fire damage is estimated to be at least 1% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In the USA, alone the total cost of fire has been estimated at US$328.5 billion. Global loss due to wildand fire is presently greater than at any time in the past. SwissRe has reported that the combined insurance losses from all wildfires worldwide in 2017 were US$14 billion, the highest ever in a single year. According to Allianz, fires and explosions in the built environment accounted for 59% of 1,807 business interruption claims globally from 2010-2014, resulting in billions of US dollars in loss.

Something must be done to facilitate substantial reduction in these losses. To better characterize the problems and develop solutions, fire safety science and engineering research needs to be integrated into societally-transformative risk mitigation and resiliency initiatives. Grand societal challenges such as changing demographics (an aging and diversely able society), rapid urbanization, the need to be more sustainable, the need to slow climate change, and the need to develop more resilient communities all have fire safety implications. Yet fire safety is rarely thought of as part of the solution to these challenges.

We would like your help in raising the profile of the benefits of fire safety science and engineering research in helping to solve critical societal challenges facing the world. We therefore invite you to participate in the IAFSS Workshop, Agenda 2030 for a Fire Safe World, on the afternoon of Tuesday, September 11, to begin work on this challenge. We have prepared a short White Paper that you should read in advance of the Workshop, which provides additional detail on the challenges and objectives moving forward.

If you accept this challenge and invitation to participate, you will be tasked with helping to draft text that can be used with key research funding entities, governmental agencies, and NGOs worldwide to facilitate funding to advance a fire safe world. Participation will be limited to the first 50 registrants. Please register only if you want to actively help develop a research strategy, talking points, and potentially white papers, which will be used to facilitate the generation of directed funding towards fire safety science research to address emerging societal challenges. Your participation will not require you to sign a joint statement on research needs although this will be encouraged as one possible outcome of the Workshop.

Registration for the workshop can be done here and register for ESFSS here. The tentative workshop agenda is below.

Tentative Workshop Agenda, 13:00-17:00, Tuesday, 11 September 2018

13:00-14:00    Introductory presentations to frame the challenges

14:00-16:00    Break-out groups to work on strategies to address future challenges

16:00-17:00    Reporting, consensus development, and framing steps forward

As we get closer to the date of the Workshop, additional information will be posted, and registrants may receive additional information by email. Thank you for your interest in this important initiative, and we look forward to seeing you in Nancy in September!

Second Announcement and Call for Papers – 3rd ESFSS

The 3rd European Symposium on Fire Safety Science will be held on September 12-14, 2018 at the University of Lorraine, in Nancy, France.

Following the conference held in Cyprus (2015), the 3rd ESFSS, will be the third edition of a series of symposia organized in Europe, with the participation of the International Association for Fire Safety Science (IAFSS). The aim is to gather researchers from and beyond Europe to have exchanges and discussions about fire safety science.

The submission site is now open. You may submit your paper on the submission platform: https://esfss2018.sciencesconf.org/ The submission deadline for papers (6 pages) is March 15, 2018. More information on the the Symposia webpage.

Congratulations Poster and Image Awardees from the 12th IAFSS Symposium!

A number of both established researchers and students were recognized for their fire science  posters and images at the 12th International Symposium on Fire Safety Science. The awardees are listed below, congratulations!

Judges Choice Outstanding Image

  • Longhua Hu, “Blooming Fire”
  • Laurens van Gelderen, Hamed Farmahini Farahani, Ali Rangwala and Grunde Jomaas, Boilover of a crude oil burning in an ice cavity

Judges Choice Outstanding Student Poster

  • Sriram Bharath Hariharan, Huahua Xiao, Evan Sluder, Michael Gollner and Elaine Oran, The Structure of the Blue Whirl: A Soot-free Vortex Phenomenon
  • Park Seong-Geun, Shin Kyung-Jae, Lee Yu-Hyeon and Min Gi-Yo, Mechanical Properties of Structural Steels at High Temperature

Judges Choice Outstanding Poster

  • Andy Rodriguez, Xinyan Huang, Shmuel Link, Sandra Olson, Paul Ferkul and Carlos Fernandez-Pello, Piloted Ignition of Cylindrical PMMA and Wood
  • Torben Grumstrup, Jason Forthofer and Mark Finney, Wildfire Flame and Plume Attachment on Slopes
  • Masayuki Mizuno, Kosuke Fujii, Hiroyuki Kadokura, Fuqiu Wang, Tomonori Sano and Ai Sekizawa, Development of Mathematical Model of Evacuation Flow in a Staircase Based on a Survey Result of a Real Evacuation Drill in a High-Rise Office Building

Delegates Choice Outstanding Image

  • Sriram Bharath Hariharan, Michael Gollner and Elaine Oran, The Blue Whirl in Transition

Delegates Choice Outstanding Poster

  • Yuqi Hu, Nieves Fernandez Anez and Guillermo Rein, Review of Emissions of Regional Haze Episodes from Smouldering Peat Fire

Honorable Mentions

  • Carmen Gorska Putynska, Juan P. Hidalgo and Jose Torero, Self-extinguishment of Exposed Cross Laminated Timber Walls in Compartment Fires
  • Yoshinari Kobayashi, Yusuke Konno, Xinyan Huang, Shinji Nakaya, Mitsuhiro Tsue, Nozomu Hashimoto, Osamu Fujita and Carlos Fernandez-Pello, Dripping Behaviors of Melted Insulation in Wire Fire under Opposed Flow

Thank you to all the judges and organizers, who were led by Prof. Naian Liu, USTC.