Blog
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Historical Fires that Influenced Building and Fire Codes
A Living Document In Canada, the two main Codes that regulate fire and life safety within buildings are the National Building Code and National Fire
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Mind the Gaps ~ Design of Hazardous Areas
You’re designing a building, or reviewing a design, and you find yourself in Subsection 3.3.6., “Design of Hazardous Areas”, of your Building Code. Now what?
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How to Apply Climatic Data to Structural Design
Recently, I’ve been aiding a customer in transitioning a proprietary building material approved for use in Canada into the United States construction industry. While working
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Building Code – Useful Bits
When learning the Building Code, there is a lot of helpful information to help you understand the ‘why’, so you can go beyond the words…you
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Selling Fire Safety? Wait…What?
As fire protection and life safety professionals we are in the business of selling fire safety. Whether you work for a Fire Department, a consulting
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A Mechanism of Trust – Third-Party Reviews
Building and fire officials assume critical roles in our communities, from building and life safety to education and investment protection. Non-bias, third-party reviews, as a
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Passive Fire Protection Systems Don’t Get The Love They Deserve: Dampers Edition – Part 2
This is Part 2 of Dampers Edition of Passive Fire Protection Systems Don’t Get The Love They Deserve. In case you missed it, here’s a
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So you have a hydrant…
If a building is on fire, how much water is needed to put the fire out? The presence of hydrants is a hopeful sign, but it should never be taken for granted that water will actually be produced in the quantities needed, or even any at all.
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Component Additive Method for Fire-Resistance Ratings
The Canadian Building Codes allow a couple of methods for determining fire-resistance ratings of assemblies, from Article 3.1.7.1.: Tests conducted in conformance with CAN/ULC-S101 (usually
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Protection of Chemical Storage – A Roadmap to NFC Subsection 3.2.7.
Chemicals can be intimidating – what hazards do they represent? How should I protect occupants from these hazards? How do I mitigate risks in a
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Designing for Deflection
A common misunderstanding about structural engineers is that we design structures so that they don’t move. This is not entirely accurate, in fact we often