NISTIR 7431 Visualization, A Tool For Understanding Fire Dynamics

Computational tools have been developed at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) for modeling fire spread and smoke transport in order that various professionals such as fire protection engineers, fire researchers, fire investigators, fire fighters, AHJ’s (authorities having jurisdiction) etc. may study the dynamics of fire with the ultimate aim of improving fire safety. These models include FDS (Fire Dynamics Simulator) for modeling fire spread and smoke transport and Smokeview for visualizing the resulting fire dynamics. This article will give an overview of many of the features and techniques one can use with Smokeview to better understand fire dynamics. Modeling is especially useful when other methods of study such as experimentation are not practical or are too dangerous to conduct.