Designing Steel Structures for Fire Safety

Fire Resistance

Fire represents one of the most severe conditions encountered during the life-time

of a structure and therefore, the provision of appropriate fire safety measures for

structural members is a major safety requirement in building design. The basis for this

requirement can be attributed to the fact that when other measures for containing the

fire fail, structural integrity is the last line of defence.





Preface

The historical approach for evaluating fire resistance of structural members is



through prescriptive-based methodologies. These methodologies have significant

drawbacks and do not provide rational fire designs. Therefore, in the last two decades

there has been important research endeavours devoted to developing better understanding

of structural behaviour under fire conditions and also to develop rational

design approaches for evaluating fire resistance of structures. This activity was particularly

significant in Western Europe where numerous research reports, Ph.D. theses

and scientific papers were published.


European technical committees were in the fore-front to implement some of the

research findings in to codes and standards to enable the application of rational fire

engineering principles in the design of structures. Among the first internationally recognised

codes of practice are, for steel elements, the recommendations of the ECCS

“European Convention for Constructional Steelwork’’ (ECCS 1983) and, for concrete

elements, the recommendations of the CEB/FIP “Comité Euro-International du béton

/ Fédération Internationale de la précontrainte’’ (CEB 1991). The fire parts of the

Eurocodes were first presented in Luxemburg in 1990. Over the next few years these

Eurocode documents have been significantly updated by incorporating new or updated

provisions based on latest research findings reported from around the world.



On similar lines, in the last few years, many countries have moved towards implementing

rational fire design methodologies in codes and standards. One such example

is the recent introduction of rational fire design approach in the latest edition of American

Institute of Steel Construction’s steel design manual. In addition, a number of

countries around the world are updating their codes and standards by introducing

performance-based fire safety design provisions. A performance-based approach to fire

safety often facilitates innovative, cost-effective and rational designs. However, undertaking

performance-based fire safety design requires the advanced models, calculation

methodologies, design manuals books and trained personnel.

The Eurocode documents, or recently updated codes and standards in other countries,

are nevertheless far from being useful textbooks, lecture notes or guidance

documents. While these codes and standards provide specifications for undertaking



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