Fire and Smoke Understanding the Hazards (1986) / Chapter Skim
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Executive Summary
Executive Summary
Pages 1-11
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The Committee's general task was to review the state of the art of combustion-product toxicity testing and fire hazard assessment. In addition, the Committee considered the relationship between the physiologic and behavioral end points currently used in combustion-product toxicity test systems and the performance capabilities of humans exposed to pyrolysis and combustion products.
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. ASSESSMENT OF FIRE HAZARD Hazard assessment, whether based on full-scale simulations or on mathematical models, requires an array of quantitative information, such as: .
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Such models assume that each compartment divides into a hot upper zone and a cold lower zone, with no mixing -- hence their frequent designation as "zone" models. In contrast, field models divide a compartment into hundreds or thousands of zones in a threedimensional array and can therefore predict fluid motion far more realistically than zone models can.
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have yielded only limited information on the biologic effects of exposure to fire products. No test providing data on incapacitation has yet been developed that is demonstrably more sensitive than the use of death as the end point, although for some fire scenarios accurate measurement of incapacitation or performance decrements could be important.
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Although there might be exceptions to this generality, it appears on the basis of the limited comparative data available that the choice of one or the other method would not alter substantially the outcome of a fire hazard assessment. For purposes of predicting the fire hazard of different materials, the Committee believes that the required smoke toxicity data are currently best obtained with animalexposure methods.
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Beyond LC50 data, the routine measurement of carbon monoxide in smoke or of carboxyhemoglobin in the blood of exposed animals, however useful such measures are for research purposes, provides no information of utility to hazard assessment efforts that is not provided with more certainty by the LC50 itself. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS There is a strong need for additional research in combustion-product toxicity testing and fire hazard assessment.
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We must therefore work to improve our ability to cope with fire by improving the fire performance of the materials that furnish the places in which we live and work, while continuing to improve building designs, fire codes, and fire detection and suppression techniques. · Although mung the highest in the world, the number of fire fatalities in the United States has been declining for the last 30 years.
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should continue, inasmuch as such markers might provide early indicators of pathologic effects of smoke toxicity. · The dynamics of a fire in generating heat and toxic products will determine the ability of people to escape; the use of fire hazard assessment to estia te ability to escape a given fire is currently the best approach to measuring the hazard associated with materials.
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· Laboratory metbDds for measuring the toxicity of combustion products have been developed to the point where relative toxicities of materials can be reliably measured. Both the NBS and the Pittsburgh test methods provide a comparison of relative toxicities; when used by different laboratories, each has reasonable reproducibility.
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Chemical tests can be extremely useful in measuring concentrations of known chemicals in combustion products and thus might become a first screen for testing toxicity. An animal biologic model acts as the ultimate integrator of the combined toxicities of combustion products, whereas a chemical assay is a selective measure of specific chemicals and might or might not detect all toxic agents.
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Powerful computers and increasingly detailed analysis of more complex spaces will lead to better understanding of the dynamics of fires and to more realistic approximation of TAE. In the meantime, however, many regulatory questions can already be answered.
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