June 2003

Fire risk management in spotlight

A number of strategies to improve the risk of fire in Department of Human Services funded services have been put forward by engineering students from the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), Massachusetts.

The three students—Daniel DeBiasio, Jeff Simpson and Mitch Lauer—spent seven weeks in the Department’s Capital Management Branch (CMB) consulting with Regional Fire Risk Coordinators and the CMB Fire Risk team.

‘In the past five years, CMB has sponsored groups of students from the WPI in Massachusetts to work on projects as diverse as access for people with a disability, web-based project administration and the design of accident and emergency departments,’ said Director of Capital Management Branch Barry Paice.

‘This year we decided to have the students work on a fire-related project, firstly because the majority of upgrade works required to bring facilities up to the new fire standards have now been completed and the focus has shifted to the ongoing maintenance of fire suppression systems and the operational readiness of facility managers.

‘Secondly, the student’s onsite advisor this year, Professor Jonathan Barnett, is an eminent fire engineer and a member of the committee appointed by the U.S. Congress to investigate the fires and subsequent collapse of buildings on the World Trade Centre site,’ Mr Paice said.

Two options identified by the students were improvements to Fire Risk Compliance certificates that funded agencies have to submit annually to Regional Fire Risk Coordinators and the development of a centralised database for recording and reporting on compliance.

‘Effective asset management is dependent on access to good facility information, Barry Paice said.

‘The research report the students have submitted to CMB proposes a number of strategies to assist agencies, Regional Fire Risk Coordinators and CMB to better manage the reporting on the management of fire risk in facilities.’