Building design has been revolutionised in recent years. New
materials and better construction techniques have allowed bespoke and
impressive public spaces to be created. Consider the Millennium Dome,
Hong Kong airport, or the 2012 Olympic stadium.
These bespoke spaces represent a significant challenge for fire
safety. Unlike for conventional buildings, with regular layouts and
dimensions, there is very little experience to suggest how fires might
develop in these spaces, and how people might react in an emergency
situation.
An Edinburgh-led consortium, called FireGrid, is developing technology
designed to tackle this specific problem head-on. By combining advanced
modelling with sensor data, in an HPC context, the FireGrid team are
developing a system that can provide fire fighters with better
information to support their response, to control the impact of a fire
emergency, and to reduce the risk to life and property.
In this talk we will review progress of the FireGrid consortium and
describe a technology prototype that has been built to demonstrate the
potential for such a system, and to stress some of the key technologies
that are required.