Fire pattern was first used to describe how the fire developed or had traveled as described by Kirk, every fire forms a pattern that is determined chiefly by the configuration of the environment and the availability of combustible material (Kirk 1969). It is suggested from this literature review that the overall reasoning process for evaluating fire damage for determining an area of origin consists of the following seven steps (Gorbett 2015): Identifying the value in further analysis of a surface or compartment; Identification of the varying degrees of fire damage (DOFD) along the surfaces of the compartment and contents; Identifying clusters and trends of damage (fire patterns); Interpreting the causal factors for the generation of the fire patterns; Testing the hypothetical area(s) of origin; and. They identified areas of damage with greater magnitude around the doorway openings. Accessed January 1, 2015, Morgan M, Henrion M (1990) Uncertainty: A Guide to Dealing with Uncertainty in Quantitative Risk and Policy Analysis. Kirk continues the discussion by cautioning the investigator that this pattern will be altered by the presence of obstructions, or of readily burned fuel in localized areas, and he warns that a very common complication arises when areas of excellent ventilation are present where intense burns will be noted in such areas that may well distract the investigator from following the fire pattern back to its point of origin (Kirk 1969). The tests were typically conducted to evaluate multiple aspects of using damage for origin determination and not just within the context of clusters of damage, therefore, many of these tests will describe fire effects, clusters of fire effects, fire pattern generation and the use of fire patterns to arrive at an area of origin. The lack of damage has often times been overlooked in most discussions related to fire patterns. Privacy a distinct area of damage or cluster of fire effects with identifiable and related lines of demarcation that share common damage characteristics, such as type, magnitude, direction and proximity (e.g. The deposition of smoke/soot onto surface linings and contents within an enclosure stems from the following: Fluid flows Temperature and velocity of the gases colliding with cooler surfaces (thermophoretic forces). Mealy et al. The measuring pin is constructed of a 2mm cobalt drill bit. 1977; Brannigan et al. They found that that floor patterns caused by ignitable liquids might be minimal because they can easily be destroyed and because the short duration of exposure due to fuel consumption. 2013), a standardized depth measurement system (Mealy et al. Dillon (1998) went on to illustrate that some of the corner flame height approximations resulted in 40% uncertainty, but others were as close as 2%. 2013). These early definitions are broad and all encompassing of the entire fire scene. Many plastic materials will burn. (3.48m3.58m) with a ceiling height of 8ft (2.4m). (2010) do not find this similar effect when performing studies in compartments where the ventilation openings are connected to adjacent compartments, not directly to the exterior. 2013). Characteristics distilled from the literature related that the ULG patterns will have level lines of demarcation with relatively uniform magnitude of damage, unless the upper layer is flowing from one location to another and, if so, the lines of demarcation will be angled towards the opening. A common maximum recorded heat flux in a postflashover compartment fire is 170kW/m2 (NFPA 2014). All of the fire pattern studies have been summarized in Additional file 1. The authors suggested that the investigator could evaluate the items involved and the differences of flammability of combustibles along the route of travel may explain the route of travel or spread (Straeter and Crawford 1955). Fire Pattern Indicator, U or V Fire pattern that resembles a U or V shape and indicates the direction of fire progression in that area. Soot deposited in rooms away from the room of origin have a fairly uniform soot deposition on all surfaces extending from floor to ceiling (Wolfe et al. Dissertation, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Gorbett G, Chapdelaine W (2014) Scientific Method Use, Application and Gap Analysis for Origin Determination. Generally, these texts encouraged investigators to visibly identify which side of a content item, wall, or structural member may have been more affected by heat. Fire and Arson Investigator Journal of the International Association of Arson Investigators 4:5558, Crofton, MD, Steckler K, Quintiere J, Rinkinen W (1982) Flow Induced by Fire in a Compartment. National Institute of Standards and Technology, NIST GCR 07907, Utiskul Y, Quintiere J (2005) Generalizations on Compartment fires from Small-scale experiments for low ventilation conditions. The ventilation-controlled conditions did not result in any upper layer damage that was discernable, therefore it will not be considered here. 2012; Mealy et al. As the gases rise and expand, they also begin to interact with ventilation openings. Scientific evidence is always incomplete to some degree, which means there is a measure of uncertainty associated within each analysis. Often times the soot deposited within the room of origin will be higher in elevation with distinct lines of demarcation and thick soot deposits. 1989; Quintiere 1995). NFPA 921 further lists that fire patterns can be classified by their generation or causal relationship to the fire dynamics by providing the following classes: plume-generated patterns, ventilation-generated patterns, hot gas layer-generated patterns, full-room involvement-generated patterns and suppression-generated patterns (NFPA 2014). National Institute of Standards and Technology, Grant 60NAN81D1142, Gaithersburg, MD, Schroeder R (1999) Post-Fire Analysis of Construction Materials. Fire occurs due to the exothermic reaction of combustion (burning), producing heat and light. Shanley et al. 2010). This pattern has been associated with a fuel package that has the potential HRR to overcome the thermal inertia and start a pyrolysis reaction in the surface material, thereby creating the pattern, but insufficient energy to produce a plume which reaches any horizontal restriction above the fuel package (Hicks et al. Only one article was identified related to the use of visible char appearance in identifying varying DOFD where quantitative measures were attempted (Keith and Smith 1984). 4). In this study, a DOFD scale was developed as a ranking system to reflect the varying degrees of visible fire damage to gypsum wallboard based on its response to heat exposure and visible damage indicators. SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering. Both compartments were furnished similarly with a sofa located under the open window, a sofa located along the wall next to the door and a kitchen table in the center of the compartment. increases. When lacking a systematic approach to solving complex problems, many professions have turned to decision support frameworks, tools or methods, the intent of which are to guide the decision by asking questions and helping to assess the weight or importance of variables. Gottuks (1992) results were gases from the layer burning and escaping, while Wieczorek et al. This is of particular concern with respect to the importance of being able to identify and properly weigh potentially subtle differences from one fire scene to the next, some of which could have significant bearing on the development of the fire and the interpretation of the evidence. The job of a forensic scientist is to provide scientific evidence, notably the analysis of scientific or engineering data, to the justice system in order to reduce uncertainty (Taroni et al. Location and elevation are essentially further describing proximity. Straeter and Crawford (1955) text identified that the point of deepest char in the wood is likely to be the point of origin of the fire. Wood stud wall with varying DOFD char damage, Depth of char contour plot of wood stud wall depicted in Fig. In fuel-controlled conditions, cues 24 were positively identified in 92% of the studies (23/25), cues 1 and 5 were positively identified in 88% of the studies (22/25), cue 6 was positively identified in 84% of the studies (21/25), and cue 7 was identified in only 68% of the studies (17/25). Hughes Associates, Maryland (USA), Bieber P (2014) Anatomy of Wrongful Arson Conviction: Sentinel Event Analysis in Fire Investigations. Standardized proficiency testing should be developed for each process developed and all users of these processes should be tested for proficiency. (1997)) contends that the source of available fresh air from adjacent spaces will have a significant influence on whether or not the ventilation-generated patterns are prevalent with such magnitude. Notice, however, none of these documents came out and directly stated that an investigator could not identify an ignitable liquid from a floor pattern based on observation, they only warned that it cannot always be reliably identified (NFPA 1992). 2009; Gorbett 2010; Gorbett et al. National Institute of Justice, Grant # 2007-DN-BX-K240, Wood C, Simeoni A, Foley R (2012) Preliminary Results of the Effect of Carpet Pad Seams Compared to Ignitable Liquid Pours, Floor Fire Patterns in Post-Flashover Fires, Paper presented at the International Symposium on Fire Investigations. hbbd``b`$;` X| b tqKwH a:H,b`bdc`$8+@ 1 Suppression factors may also impact the visible and measurable damage that investigators use. (0.91m2.1m). Several myths have been associated with geometric shapes that cause investigators pause before using the shapes as descriptors. SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineers, NFPA, MA, Wieczorek C, Vandsburger U, Floyd J (2004) An evaluation of the global equivalence ratio concept for compartment fires: data analysis methods. National Fire Protection Association, Quincy (USA), NFPA (2001) NFPA 921-Guide for Fire and Explosion Investigation. Several correlations have been developed to assist in determining the minimum HRR necessary for flashover to occur, conditioned on the total surface area of the compartment (AT) and the ventilation factor \( {A}_v\sqrt{h_v} \) (McCaffrey and Quintiere (1977); Babrauskas 1980; McCaffrey et al. The statistics can be found in Additional file 1 associated with this review paper. Putorti (2001) performed a series of experiments that evaluated the damage to a variety of floor surfaces (carpet, wood and vinyl) with varying volumes of ignitable liquids used in the open. This was the first time that investigators were encouraged to assign some reliability to their origin conclusion, however, the authors failed to provide guidelines on how specifically to arrive at the initial origin hypothesis. The resulting damage appears to be angled lines of demarcation with the lower end of the line of demarcation being nearest the source of the smoke flow (Fig. Despite the lack of validity and this caution, the training and textbooks within the profession during this time used these indicators as a means to link an observation to the speed of the fire and ultimately to the conclusion of fire cause. Correspondence to (2013) designed a tool based on the previous work of Ngu (2004), which used a force gauge with an attached hex key probe (2mm diameter). The second part isolates the work conducted on identifying fire patterns and the characteristics associated with these trends within the damage. 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