Lai’an Fire Tests: Influence of Opening Condition on the Fire Dynamics of Real Urban Village Dwellings

Abstract

As the most common informal settlement in the far east, urban villages are subject to very high fire risks due to relatively poor fire safety conditions and inefficient management. However, no experimental research has been conducted on the fire dynamics of Chinese urban village dwellings to date despite their own characteristics. In this work, two real-scale experiments with different opening conditions (both window and door open or closed) were performed in two urban village dwellings located in Lai’an County, with identical dimensions of 4.4 (length) × 3.3 (width) × 2.8 (height) m3 and a fuel load of 407 MJ/m2. The important parameters, in terms of inside gas temperatures, burning behavior, gas flow velocities at the opening, total heat release rate and flame behavior, were measured or estimated. It was found that the effect of the opening condition has a significant influence on the flashover occurrence, smoke movement and temperature distributions. In particular, with the window and door closed, the compartment fire self-extinguished, but the breakage and fallout of glass panels dramatically changed the fire dynamics from smouldering combustion to a post-flashover compartment fire. The interaction between enclosure fire dynamics and the fallout of window and door was then established. The experimental results would provide basic data and perception for further numerical or analytical analysis concerning the fire safety of urban village dwellings.