Car Fires in Multi-Story Parking Garages

Abstract

Automated multi-story parking garages are modern alternatives to conventional parking structures to save space and volume in high demand parking spaces in urban areas. The design of such structures has significant knowledge gaps in terms of fire safety. The purpose of this study is to estimate the horizontal and vertical fire spread between passenger cars in automated multi-story parking garages and provide fire safety design to minimize fire spread and possible structural collapse. The fire spread between cars is established by estimating irradiance heat flux of each car component. An 8-floor automated multi-story parking garage with 56 passenger car capacity is designed in accordance with European standards. The results show that steel parking pallets underneath cars reach extreme temperatures about 1000 ℃ in early phases of fire for Category III vehicle fire with 8 MW maximum heat release rate, which could cause structural failure. Without any fire protection on the structure, the fire spreads to the car above in 23 minutes, to the neighboring car in 37 minutes and beyond the elevator shaft to the other cars in 82 minutes. The proposed sprinkler layout eliminates fire spread within 5 minutes. The most efficient way of passive fire protection is to seal steel pallet, its rail system and beams on the elevator shaft with 5 cm gypsum-based fire protection boards.