What Do Engineers Do?
Fire Protection Engineering
Fire Protection Engineering, commonly referred to as fire engineering or fire safety engineering, is the application of science and engineering principles to protect people and their environments from the destructive effects of smoke and fire.
While fire is a necessary tool in our society, it also poses a significant threat when uncontrolled. In the United States alone, fires are responsible for over $10 billion in property damages and 3,000 deaths each year, which is why fire protection engineering has become an important and rapidly growing field.
Fire Protection engineers analyze how buildings are used, how fires start, how fires grow, and how fire and smoke affect people, buildings and property. Fire protection engineers use the latest technologies to:
- Design systems that control fires, alert people to danger and provide means for escape;
- Evaluate buildings to pinpoint the risks of fires and the means to prevent them;
- Conduct fire safety research on consumer products and construction materials;
- Investigate fires to discover how fire spreads, why protective measures failed, and how those measures could have been designed more effectively.
They work with architects and other engineers, state and local building officials and local fire departments to build and maintain fire safe communities. They make recommendations for cost effective fire protection solutions to ensure that the structure, and the property and occupants contained within are adequately protected. They play a critical role in society and are a part of some of the most notorious events of the twentieth century, including the investigation of California wild fires, the collapse of the World Trade Center, and the evolution of NASA equipment and space program safety.
Fire Protection Engineers are not firefighters, though they do work closely with this group. As a Fire Protection engineer, you could work in the following roles and industries:
- Consulting Engineering Firms
- Fire Departments
- Fire Equipment and Systems Manufacturers
- Government
- Hospitals and Health Care Facilities
- Insurance Industry
- Research & Testing Laboratories
- Universities & Colleges
- Entertainment Industry
- Forensic Investigations
Salary:
$79,000
Meet JETS Extreme Engineers
Read the PE Times issue:
November 2007, Issue #61
March 2006, Issue #47
April 2005, Issue #39
Related Links
'The Chemistry of Fire'
An exciting website with experiments and videos for the classroom.
Communications Team Erects Lifeline for Firefighters Battling California Wildfires
Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE)
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