Current Situation of Fire Safety Condition for Steel Structures in Dhaka: Exploring Fire Resilient Design

Abstract

Steel framed building plays a vital role in construction sector with respect to Bangladesh’s socio-economic development due its long spanning capability and better flexibility. Yet there is very insufficient attention for the fire safety in steel buildings. Given the lack of fire risk assessment in steel building, this study intends to develop an understanding in fire safety condition in the sector. With the help of software analysis, this study presented the fire resistance capacity of steel at 816°C for minimum 30 minutes. Also, a field survey was conducted in 25 steel buildings situated at Dhaka city or near Dhaka like Gazipur, Savar, Narayngonj to picture the actual safety conditions in steel buildings. After analyzing the survey data, this study develops fire risk index for individual steel building with a scale 0 to 4, with average FRI 2.46 which indicates the poor fire safety condition in most of the buildings. The poor FRI values shows large deviations from standard fire safety requirements set by Bangladesh National Building Code (BNBC-2006). Stricter monitoring and enforcement of rules by the authority and increasing awareness is recommended to improve safety condition and practice among the users of steel buildings.