Fires in workplace premises: risk data

Abstract

London is a capital city with a population of seven million people. It shares many problems with other cities around the world, including the risk of uncontrolled fires in workplace premises. In order to provide an effective assessment of fire risk in the workplace and help London Fire Brigade to devise a suitable inspection programme for the implementation of fire precaution regulations, quantitative information on the likelihood of fires occurring in different types of workplace premises is required. Such information has been obtained from London Fire Brigade's Real Fire Library (RFL)—a unique database of information collected from real fire incidents by dedicated teams of fire investigators operating in the Greater London area. This paper presents an analysis of fire probability and risk data for London, quantifying the likelihood and associated risk of fires occurring in different types of workplace. The data collected in the RFL is also used to identify the most common fire scenario characteristics occurring in each type of workplace.