§ 101-6.603 - Definitions.

(a) Qualified fire protection engineer is defined as an individual, with a thorough knowledge and understanding of the principles of physics and chemistry governing fire growth, spread, and suppression, meeting one of the following criteria:

(1) An engineer having an undergraduate or graduate degree from a college or university offering a course of study in fire protection or firesafety engineering, plus a minimum of four (4) years work experience in fire protection engineering,

(2) A professional engineer (P.E. or similar designation) registered in Fire Protection Engineering, or

(3) A professional engineer (P.E. or similar designation) registered in a related engineering discipline and holding Member grade status in the International Society of Fire Protection Engineers.

(b) Flashover means fire conditions in a confined area where the upper gas layer temperature reaches 600 °C (1100 °F) and the heat flux at floor level exceeds 20 kW/m2 (1.8 Btu/ft2/sec).

(c) Reasonable worst case fire scenario means a combination of an ignition source, fuel items, and a building location likely to produce a fire which would have a significant adverse impact on the building and its occupants. The development of reasonable worst case scenarios must include consideration of types and forms of fuels present (e.g., furniture, trash, paper, chemicals), potential fire ignition locations (e.g., bedroom, office, closet, corridor), occupant capabilities (e.g., awake, intoxicated, mentally or physically impaired), numbers of occupants, detection and suppression system adequacy and reliability, and fire department capabilities. A quantitative analysis of the probability of occurrence of each scenario and combination of events will be necessary.

(d) Room of origin means an area of a building where a fire can be expected to start. Typically, the size of the area will be determined by the walls, floor, and ceiling surrounding the space. However, this could lead to unacceptably large areas in the case of open plan office space or similar arrangements. Therefore, the maximum allowable fire area should be limited to 200 m2 (2000 ft2) including intervening spaces. In the case of residential units, an entire apartment occupied by one tenant could be considered as the room of origin to the extent it did not exceed the 200 m2 (2000 ft2) limitation.