IFC Consultants see life from the Fire Service side

IFC Consultants see life from the Fire Service side

The Fire Engineering Department of the LFEPA set up an unusual initiative by giving fire consultants the opportunity of seeing life from the eyes of a fire-fighter. The initiative was to organise a fire experience day during which the attendees were exposed to the typical rigors of a fire-fighter when attending an incident.

The initiative was set up because it is relatively easy for a an over enthusiastic fire consultant, sat in his office in normal civilian clothes to change a fire resistance period, to extend a travel distance, or to ignore the limitations that fire-fighting equipment imposes upon the Fire Service.

International Fire Consultants Ltd, probably the largest team of consultants who apply Fire Safety Engineering into real life projects was pleased to support this initiative. As a consequence, five of the consultants, split between those who are primarily involved in building design and those who are involved in product evaluation, spent a day at Southwark Training Centre being put through their paces. The consultants who attended were given the experience of manipulating charged hoses, preparing to attack a fire in the confines of a 5m2 lobby and to walk up numerous flights of stairs in full breathing apparatus.

At the end of the day all of the IFC consultants considered that the experience had been a worthwhile exercise bringing the reality of B5 to life. No longer were the design constraints just numbers. All of them agreed that the day had been well spent and that they would be wiser consultants as a consequence.

IFC’s support for this day demonstrates its commitment to delivering top quality practical fire designs to an increasingly discerning client base of developers and architects.

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