Welcome to Season 2 of Uncovered Witness: Fire Science Revelations! This season, the show's theme is Humans as part of a fire safety engineered system. In this series, we will unravel our understanding of human behaviour in fires and how this complex behaviour may be accounted for in the fire-safe design of buildings. Our understanding of the occupant response, decision-making process and biases may influence our design of exits and improve (or impede) the egress process.

In the second episode of the series, we focus on the actions taken by the occupants from the moment they receive information about the fire to the moment when they start their evacuation. This includes response to fire cues - from the flames and smoke, through evacuation alarms and observing the reaction of others. We go into how people perceive the threat from a fire and how this perception is affected by the presence of others. With the examples of the Beverly Hills Supper Club and MGM Grand fires, we illustrate some of the most fundamental concepts related to occupant response and wayfinding. Finally, we discuss the group behaviours, touching also on the definitions of rational and irrational behaviour.

Useful links:

• Max Kinateder et. al. review on risk perception in fires
• Erica Kuligowski et. al. guidance on behaviour modelling, including the PADM framework mentioned in the episode
• Fire Science Show episode 019 with Erica Kuligowski on modelling human behaviour in wildfire evacuations

Guests featured in this podcast episode:

• Prof. Daniel Nilsson, University of Canterbury, Halliwell Fire Research
• Josh Gibbons, Halliwell Fire Research

This show is produced by the Fire Science Media for Halliwell Fire Research. Executive producer - Monika Węgrzyńska, scripting and production - Monika and Wojciech Węgrzyńscy, sound engineer - Mikołaj Jarząbek. All rights reserved. 2024.