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Lahaina Fire

Wildfire impact in wildland urban interfaces (WUI)

Our research group studies wildfires in the WUI communities to develop actionable information on how the hazard directly impacts these communities. We collect and analyze data, establish models to understand  interaction of building layout and construction (i.e., human systems), and environmental parameters (i.e., natural systems such as weather and vegetation), and change the risk of a community being substantially affected by a wildfire.

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Performance-based fire engineering (PBFE)

Our group works on PBFE approaches that has gained attention in recent years, to develop design solutions for buildings that are safer, more efficient and cost effective, or applicable to more complex architectural configurations. The design of fire protection in the PBFE is based on calculating the structure’s performance under realistic fire scenarios.

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Probabilistic approaches in structural fire engineering

Our research has developed probabilistic material models for steel and concrete structures at elevated temperatures, and we have been studying the influence of model choice on structural failure assessment of steel and concrete structures exposed to fire.

We also work towards quantifying and harmonizing safety of structures designed for fire.

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Structural fire testing

We have developed a method for introducing active boundary conditions during experimental testing of structural elements at elevated temperatures. This approach enhances element-based testing techniques by enabling cost-effective experiments that capture system-level responses, a method known as hybrid testing in fire engineering.

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Tunnels and fire

Our goal is to increase the fire resilience of existing and new tunnels subject to fire events. This is achieved by developing a better understanding of the effects of fire on tunnel structure integrity and establishing a scenario-based risk assessment methodology to quantify fire damage to tunnel lining considering soil-liner interaction.

We have conducted furnace tests of loaded and restrained reinforced concrete slabs at the Structural Engineering and Earthquake Simulation Laboratory (SEESL) to study their performance under a railway tunnel fire scenario.

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Fire following earthquake

We have been working on a loss estimation and decision making tool for managing fire following earthquake (FFE) at the community level. We have developed a framework to integrate performance of water and power networks, buildings and bridges in the transportation network to identify vulnerable parts of a community to post-earthquake fires.

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