- Author
- Taylor, J.
- Title
- Post Earthquake Fire in Tall Buildings and the New Zealand Building Code.
- Coporate
- University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
- Report
- Fire Engineering Research Report 03/6, February 2003, 154 p.
- Distribution
- FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT: School of Engineering, University of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand. Telephone: 643-364-2250, Fax: 643-364-2758, Website: http://www.civil.canterbury.ac.nz
- Keywords
- earthquakes | high rise buildings | building codes | fire safety | regulations | risk assessment | sprinklers | fire growth | structural damage | damage | escape means | fire spread | risk analysis | literature reviews | structural design
- Identifiers
- effect of earthquake on building fire safety; performance codes for fire design; New Zealand regulatory requirements; fire design to the New Zealand acceptable solutions; reliability of fire safety systems: before and after
- Abstract
- This report examines the factors involved in determining the fire safety in tall buildings following an earthquake, and assesses the risk to occupants in such an event for a building designed to the Acceptable Solutions of the New Zealand Building Code. The development of performance based design requirements for fire is reviewed, with particular reference to the New Zealand Building Code. The usual philosophy of such building codes is that they should consider all potential events that could lead to an unsatisfactory level of risk. The Acceptable Solutions of the New Zealand Code provide non-mandatory prescriptive design options for compliance. The section on fire safety does not specifically consider the impact of post- earthquake fire in the determining fire safety provisions. Of particular concern is the high probability of failure of active and passive fire safety systems observed in earthquake events throughout the world. The Acceptable Solution is also widely used as a base document for setting the safety level for alternative designs. Unfortunately it contains many provisions that lack the consi'stency, transparency and technical validation to give practitioners confidence that its use will guarantee satisfactory performance. In this report, a case study building designed to the Acceptable Solution is assessed for life safety following an earthquake, and the probability of loss of life in event of a fire is found to be significant. Failures of the sprinkler system and the passive protection to the stairs are identified as the principal contributors to the unsatisfactory perfonnance, and recommendations are made for improving their reliability. Recommendations are made to improve the post-earthquake reliability of fire safety systems and to amend the New Zealand Building Code Acceptable Solution to include the consideration of earthquake vulnerability of systems and utilities. Recommendations are also made to strengthen the technical basis of the Acceptable Solution.