In 2021, the village Finsjö in Sweden experienced an abnormally large wildfire. During an intervention lasting for 6 days, Fire and Rescue Services [FRS] received spontaneous help from volunteers, leading to valuable contributions but also questions regarding how to address division of responsibilities. Through qualitative interviews with the FRS, this study explores the interaction between formal and informal responsibilities and how FRS representatives perceive spontaneous volunteer contributions. We will show how informal response benefits come from complementing formal duties by answering to specific kinds of needs, and how challenges emerge from questions of dependence and accountability

This study explores how the Fire and Rescue Service can better prepare for solving complex problems in emergencies by using the concept of problems and problem-solving networks. Primary and secondary data from an extensive fire incident were analysed, including semi-structured interviews and incident assessment reports. Complex problems that arise during emergencies can be challenging to define, and solutions can be difficult to identify. However, this study demonstrates that breaking down complex problems into sub-problems can facilitate the identification of what kind of problem-solving network is needed to be able to solve problems in emergencies. Overall, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of the rationale behind problem-solving network in emergency situations and highlights the importance of relationships in problem-solving network to address complex problems during emergencies. 

The construction sector is of great importance to the Swedish economy, but its impact on the climate is significant and the sector accounts for about 40% of Sweden's total energy consumption. The sector also generates a significant share of the total material flows and waste quantities in the society. Thus, due to the large impact of the construction sector, there are great opportunities to contribute positively by reducing the climate impact through change and modernization. There are many activities focused on reducing construction waste in various ways and the issue of material and product reuse has received increasing attention in recent years. However, very little work has focused on products associated with fire safety requirements. This paper provides an overview of research on the reuse of materials and products with a focus on products with fire safety requirements. In addition, it provides a review of the Swedish building legislation and its impact on the possibility of reusing materials and products with fire safety requirements. Finally, possible paths are explored for introducing more large-scale reuse of such materials and products. © 2023 The Authors

Fires are a major hazard resulting in high monetary costs, personal suffering, and irreplaceable losses. The consequences of a fire can be mitigated by early detection systems which increase the potential for successful intervention. The number of false alarms in current systems can for some applications be very high, but could be reduced by increasing the reliability of the detection system by using complementary signals from multiple sensors. The current study investigates the novel use of machine learning for fire event detection based on acoustic sensor measurements. Many materials exposed to heat give rise to acoustic emissions during heating, pyrolysis and burning phases. Further, sound is generated by the heat flow associated with the flame itself. The acoustic data collected in this study is used to define an acoustic sound event detection task, and the proposed machine learning method is trained to detect the presence of a fire event based on the emitted acoustic signal. The method is able to detect the presence of fire events from the examined material types with an overall F-score of 98.4%. The method has been developed using laboratory scale tests as a proof of concept and needs further development using realistic scenarios in the future. © 2022, The Author(s).

In Sweden the responsibility for environmental damage when emergency responders are called to an incident is increasingly focussing on the responders. The problem is that most incident response personnel do not have the training and expertise to assess the environmental consequences of their suppression operations. The Fire Impact Tool was developed for training responders about how fire effluents and suppression media affect air, surface/groundwater and soil. The tool has three interdependent parts: fire models (for vehicles and enclosures), an environmental risk assessment (ERA) model for local impacts, and a life cycle assessment (LCA) model for global impacts. Users can create two scenarios that are compared with a reference case in which responders arrive at the incident and prevent the fire from spreading beyond the vehicle or enclosure but do not suppress the fire. The Fire Impact Tool is not intended for use during an actual fire incident. This work does not answer every question for every possible fire scenario, but it does provide a framework for deeper, broader, more comprehensive training and pre-planning. This is a necessary step toward a future in which responders are prepared to make informed decisions about firefighting strategies and tactics that include environmental consequences.

Programmet ”IMI-verktyget” (se länk till höger) är utvecklat för att ge räddningstjänst, studenter och forskare ett verktyg för att öka kunskapen angående konsekvenserna av taktiska val vid respons till en brand, exemplifierad av några fordons- och rumsbränder.

I rapporten till höger (”fulltext”) beskriver hur verktyget fungerar och innehåller också exempel på datorlabbar som skulle kunna genomföras inom en brandingenjörsutbildning eller räddningsledarutbildning.

The 2016 DiNenno Prize recognizes oxygen consumption calorimetry as a significant technical achievement that has had a major impact on public safety. Oxygen consumption calorimetry has made the measurement of heat release rate of a fire a routine part of fire testing for both research and for regulatory compliance. Heat release rate is a primary metric of fire size which is foundational in modern fire protection engineering. The 2016 Philip J. DiNenno Prize is awarded to Dr. William Parker, with ample commendation to his deceased collaborator, Dr. Clayton Huggett. Others who made contributions to the early development and application of oxygen consumption calorimetry include Peter Hinkley, William Christian, Thomas Waterman, Darryl Sensenig, Ralph Krause, Richard Gann, Vyto Babrauskas, Gunnar Heskestad, Norm Alvares, Donald Beason, and Brady Williamson. This review presents an overview of the background to the technological development and its impact on public safety