127 Introducing the Book of Fire: An Online Resource Hub for Fire Engineers

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Hello everybody, welcome to the Fire Science Show. Everyone of us Fire Engineers had to go through extensive self-learning process, developing skillsets and knowledge required to do our jobs, whether you're in industry, research, academia. We all had to catch up because Fire Science is just such a vast place to be in and this learning is kind of inherent to being FireSafe engineer. I've started the podcast introducing my mission to learn a lot from the world's best Fire Scientists and Engineers and share this learning process with you. At some point I've switched my mission statement into more like bringing Fire Science to engineers who may not even know what it is and where to find it, which I think better explains what I am practically trying to do. But learning and improving my skills as a Fire Engineer is an important part of this mission. A few weeks ago I was reflecting on this mission and how I am accomplishing the learning part, and I figured out that there's a group of people in the industry, namely the younger Fire Engineers or people who just enter the Fire Safety Engineering, who may not be benefiting that much from the podcast because perhaps they don't have the basin that's required to digest everything being said in here. Perhaps there is simply too much. Perhaps they are looking for some specific knowledge. And the podcast episodes you know, for me they come at a very organized manner, but for you they may seem a little bit random in choice of topics. So I figured out it would be nice to create something for the group of engineers who just enter the profession. And after a lot of thinking I figured out it cannot be just a podcast episode. It has to be something bigger. So here I am revealing to you my next big project, maybe not as big as podcast, but bigger than your ordinary project. I call it the Book of Fire, and it's gonna be awesome. It's gonna be a resource hub with a ton of learning material and links to all great places over the net that you can learn from. So you Fire Engineer, whether you are someone who's just entering the discipline or someone who has already established themselves in the Fire Safety Engineering, you can quickly find resources that are helping you to improve and do your job better. And why I'm doing it, what's it gonna be and how it will look like and perhaps how you can help me building it better. Well, I'll tell you that after the intro, so I hope you stay with me for that and if you're not interested, just let me give you three key informations about the resource. First of all, it's gonna be free, it's gonna be available in beta at the end of November and it's gonna be awesome. Let's go. Welcome to the Firescience Show. My name is Wojcicki Węciński and I will be your host. This podcast is brought to you in collaboration with OFR Consultants, a multi-award winning independent consultancy dedicated to addressing fire safety challenges. Ofr is the UK's leading fire risk consultancy. Its globally established team has developed a reputation for preeminent fire engineering expertise, with colleagues working across the world to help protect people, property and environment. Ofr is calling all graduates, as it is opening the Graduate Application Scheme for another year, inviting prospective colleagues to join their team from September 2024. If you take this opportunity, you'll be provided with fantastical practical immersion into fire engineering and a unique opportunity to work with leading technical experts in the field, while learning the skills critical to becoming a trusted consultant to clients. Then these offers just for you. If you would like to check out this opportunity, please visit OFRconsultantscom for fertile details and instructions on how to apply. Okay, let's go. So first let me try and introduce you why I'm building a new resource app and why podcast is not enough for this particular goal, so it actually was meant to be a podcast episode. I've posted a link in some time ago. Give me your best resources for newcomers into profession so I can make a podcast episode for new fire engineers that come in, and I was flooded. Thank you very much for that. But I was flooded with great resources, great thoughts, a lot of confusion, actually a lot of opposing thoughts on what fire safety engineer is and what they need to succeed. After that I've refreshed episode 24 with Jimmy Johnson on who is the fire engineer, to give me some ideas on what fire engineers could be looking for, and I've realized the podcast episode is not gonna be that helpful to everyone. I mean I could drop and list 10 books and 10 journals and maybe 10 online resources in one podcast episode, shooting like a machine gun with links, but it's not gonna be very helpful to anyone listening. So I figured out okay, podcast is not the way. How could we do it better? It's a lot of blogs, really great websites, that have this type of information that I want to create and, of course, there's gonna be a segment of the book of fire about those pages. Those pages give you links to everything, but they don't give you a context. They simply provide you information but they don't walk you through the information. So I thought it's important to not just give links, repositories, but at least take the person on a journey and tell them where you can find stuff and what you can expect from those pages. So in the end, I figured out this repository looks very much like an online course, and I've done a lot of online courses as a participant. I know how it works. I thought this is a framework, a skeleton that could be used to host such a resource hub, and that's what I've chosen to build. So the book of fire is gonna be some sort of an online course. The objective is not really to just go from module one to end of the module three and be done with it. The objective is to have something you can revisit and easily find information in. But I think the framework of an online course will give the best flexibility for me as a creator, so I can update the modules whenever I like. I can grow them. It's gonna give a great flexibility for you as the consumer, because you will be able to jump from module to module and just to relisten to one unit and just have everything at your hand in a structured format. And one more benefit of an online course because I will build it on a software platform called Circle is that it's community-based courses, so there will be a community aspect in it. You will be able to communicate with other ones who are using this, and perhaps it will become a living organism where people will be sharing new resources as they come. It will help me maintain the thing fresh so it always has the newest, best information. When I was contemplating to build this, I reflected on my own career as a fire safety engineer. So, okay, let's go. Let me give you the story. I did the main school fire service in Warsaw, which is kind of a firefighting officer school with civilian component where we train fire safety engineers, and that's the course I did. There was a lot of firefighting stuff. It was a lot of active fire protection, quite a lot of passive fire protection, so those things I think were covered really, really, really well. There was good fire dynamics thermodynamic dynamics perhaps on the hot side, but I've enjoyed it a lot, and also this has triggered my career in smoke control and simulations and everything. Risk engineering was good as well, but some of the things were all over the place. It was hard to like. Some things were quite deep, like the active fire protection, smoke alarms, sprinklers. Some stuff were not that deep. So exiting the school looking for a job, I found a job at the Building Research Institute, itb, at a smoke control division. So smoke control was a thing that was almost not covered at all. It was very basic information given at the school. So my first task when I joined the new company was to bring myself up to a standard, to do some real engineering on smoke control. And this was the first time when I really had to dig through resources to obtain the missing knowledge. I needed to know how this thing works and my colleagues from the office, of course they were very helpful in bringing me up on the stuff that I needed. But there was a significant component of self-learning. It was even harder because it was not just self-learning, it was also self-finding and the resources that could be useful. It's possible that you learn smoke control, fds and stuff like that on your own. It's just a lot harder when you don't know where to start. And then once I've, let's say, mastered the NFPA, 204s, 92s, fds and stuff like that, then I've learned that I am missing a huge chunk of knowledge required to effectively do projects on buildings, because I had no idea how the business operations side works on the buildings that I was working for. You know, there's a big difference if you're designing a shopping mall or a residential building, not just from how the architecture looks, but what the people expect from those buildings, what they want them to achieve, because that drives so many decisions in the design process and the end use of the building that you have to be aware of. I didn't know the technicalities of the systems we were working with. I mean, I knew that the smoke sensors detect smoke and they issue alarm, but how exactly this happens in the electronics of your building, what are the possible issues, what are the possible things that can go wrong with that and how that affects the performance of my smoke control system. That is something I had to learn on the buildings and it was not very much covered in the school. I didn't understand. As a new engineer, I didn't understand the historical context of codes, laws, magical numbers and all this stuff like that. So I only knew the newest version because that's what I was learning and I was jumping on the projects where someone told me oh no, no, because of a code in 2002 that existed, we had to do it like this and it remains like this and you just have to deal with that, so. So that was a thing I need to find, and I didn't really understand why we are doing a lot of those things, many of those things. You know, if I read an FPA204, I have an idea of how the system should work. What are the design goals? And then I come to a project in Poland and then the design goals are quite different and I don't understand why. Like what would we do it like that? Why are we are not doing it that the other way? And Doing the podcast really made me realize that all over the world, you will have the same problems every. Every time you do a project in a different context, you'll have to have a different set of knowledge. Actually, in episode 24, with Jimmie Johnson, I've defined fire safety engineering as being able to apply global knowledge and fire into your local problem, and that is something we all do in our fire practice. We need to find the global knowledge, because the local knowledge is not always existing and this global knowledge has to be turned into a Local context. So you have to know what's happening globally. You know, you have to know what resources, what's the knowledge in the whole fire science and you need to apply it to your local context. And finally, in all of this, I found it's really critical to understand what you actually don't know. It makes your job so much easier if you have an overview of what's out there that you have perhaps not mastered yet, so you realize what you don't know and you can learn that that's that's very helpful. So my fire safety engineering journey was a lot of learning at the beginning a lot, and I didn't have a great resource hub for that. So that's one of the reasons why I'm trying to build a book of science today, so the future engineers have an easier start than I had. Also, at some point I've realized that stuff I don't know I have to find out on my own. And then I've realized that Finding important stuff on your own is something called fire science. And that's why I became scientist, because actually, when you start investigating stuff that doesn't exist, you try to find things that are Not there in the code. You, you have to escape the bubble and Find new knowledge or create new knowledge. If you cannot obtain a number, you have to do research, conduct research, and that's exactly what science is to me. So I also want to. Given that I have an overview of being an engineer and a scientist, I also want to provide resources from all worlds together in one space so engineers have easy access to fire science, so fire scientists have some access to engineering resources in the same space. Because these things are so well connected, it's necessary to have them in one place. I've also learned, being an engineer and a scientist over the years, that there are some very specific things I really need and there are things I don't really need that much. So we really need some numbers to work with. You know design fires, fuel loads, fire characteristics, human movement speeds, pre evacuation distributions, how to, guidelines, step-by-step instructions on how to do stuff, frameworks and so on, so on. There are those practical things that we really look for, and Today I know there are a ton of resources that can give you those answers Answers fairly quickly, and if you cannot find them there, there's a good chance you'll have to work them out on your own. So, again, another reason to bring all those databases. You know online resource hubs, books with that and stuff like that Into one space. So even if you're a seasoned fire engineer, you appreciate being able to just go into one research space and then find the links to those. So as a scientist and engineer with the background in Poland, my, let's say, experience base is very limited to my own case study. But for this project I'm teaming up with a Spanish company, jbva Gabriel Levine, jimmy Johnson who you know from the podcast very popular episodes they've made, and these guys worked for a big company in the UK, then moved to Spain to start their own company. Gabriel is also an academic, jimmy is the president of SFP and he was leading the core competencies curriculum project, which you've learned from the previous podcast episodes about. So all together we cover a lot of backgrounds, a lot of national contexts at least European and a lot of career paths. So I'll use Gabriel's and Jimmy's wisdom to make this resource hub more complete. And if you have your own origin story that you think it's important to share with others, or you have your own pathway into fire engineering, let me know because we can build on that and incorporate it into the book of fire. So now we know why I'm doing this. Let's talk about for whom I am doing this. Obviously, this resource base will be perfect place for any upcoming fire engineer, for anyone who just begins their professional education, for anyone who just switched their career paths into fire, for anyone who has just joined a consultancy company and have to start over In a field they perhaps are not an expert in yet. So it's a perfect resource base for those who have to learn. This is the main target of the book of fire, but it's also going to be useful to anyone who's responsible for managing the newcomers. So if in your company you have to train someone, if in your company you're responsible of teaching younger engineers, this will, be for sure, very helpful to you because it will have a lot of resources that you can just redirect people into and have the knowledge delivered to them. So I really hope this will be useful not just for the newcomers but to many more senior engineers Also, because a big part of the course will be useful resources like links to the videos, databases, stuff like that. I'm pretty sure that many of fire engineers, even if they don't need learning resources, they will revisit this part of the book of fire because I will simply make it convenient for you to find a lot of interesting stuff in there. So you know why. You know for whom. Let's try talk what it will be about and what you will find inside. So to give you a fairly complete overview, it's going to be an online course. It will be called the book of fire and you'll be able to find it at thebookoffirecom Inside. I'm blessed with talking to multiple interesting people from the realm of fire science in the podcast here, so they usually shower me with resources, so I am simply taking those resources and categorizing them, making a library of links and recording videos that highlight what you can find inside of them. That's how the whole thing will be structured. So inside you will find three main modules, modules being bigger chunks of material that are further subdivided into individual lessons. One will be on fire safety, engineer career pathways and core competencies, where I will use the example of SFP core competencies, by the way, discussed with Jimmy Johnson, episode 24, I highly recommend listening to that episode because it gives you a ton of background to all of this. So in this episode we will talk about what skills fire engineer has to have, how wide those skillsets are, where are they and what kind of competencies one should obtain. With this part, I hope to give an overview on what fire scientists or engineer could know, because it will make finding knowledge much easier. We're also gonna talk about Future proofing fire safety engineering. So because I want this to be a resource valuable for young engineers that come to profession and Profession in 10, 20 years will look nothing like it looks today, I think so I'll talk about how I'm future proofing my Work and what are the trends, emerging technologies and stuff. It's really well investing your time. So that's module one. Module two that's perhaps gonna be the most used module resources for engineers and scientists, where we will go through the essential resources. I've identified essential books, the sources of credible fire knowledge, including peer reviewed Journals. To be honest, as an engineer, I had no idea what the peer reviewed journal is and why being peer reviewed is so important to being a journal. Like seriously. I had no idea and now, as an academic, I know and I'm gonna tell all my engineering friends why it's important and where you can find them and how you can access them for free. We are gonna discuss how to find those scientific resources and how to make sure the resources you're looking for are credible. We will go through all the commercial community projects that Give some sort of knowledge databases, resource basis blocks, podcasts and so on, so on. I'll also try to list some of the main conferences, at least the ones that I'm attending. Perhaps this is the part of the book of fire that will be continuously growing because people will like to put their conferences in the agenda, but it's also important so people know where to find the knowledge. The module three will be on building skills and experiences. So I really believe these are two different things knowledge or skills and the experience. Knowledge you can learn, experience you have to experience. That's my opinion and I'm gonna tell you all about how to get knowledge and how to build up experiences. We are gonna discuss the professional associations that are in the realm of fire, some tools that are commonly used and how to start using them. We will discuss code speak and different systems you can find around the world that are related to the codes and standards. We're gonna discuss some basic academic skills, you know, writing Literature, reviews and stuff like that, because I think as fire engineers we do that a lot and it's very helpful to know how it's done. So all of this three modules. On the battle lunch I will have module one and two ready. I'm almost finished with them, so I'm very sure that these two modules will be ready. Module three will be in the making, so I think I will be just Uploading it as we go through the battle lunch. It's gonna last for three to four weeks, so if there's a few dozen of people there with me who are participating in the course and giving me the Feedback on what works, what doesn't work, I can make it better on the fly. So the moment we launch it for real, it's it's gonna be the most perfect experience I could craft. So now I've mentioned Battle Launch, so let me share the schedule how I would love it to happen. I think 27th November, that's my intended date for Battle Launching the whole thing. So on that day, the online environment of the course should go up Today. If you go to thebookoffirecom, you will see a waiting page so you can sign up with your email and I'll send you links to log when the thing goes live. So if you would like to be notified about when the whole project is starting, go to thebookoffirecom now, and if you're listening this after the launch, the Book of Fire is probably there, so I hope you are able to access and just sign in directly the full launch. I am not sure what's your feedback gonna be and how much critical opinions there will be about the content, so I'm not sure how much work I will have to put to polish the thing, but I intend to launch it before Christmas. So I've set up a date for myself 20th December for the full launch. I hope this is something we can achieve. I would really love to launch it this year. So that is my aim, that is my goal and I hope we can make it on that date. But it's not Casting Stone. So basically, if you tell me I have to rework it from scratch, I'm gonna hate you, but I'll do it because I really want it to be the best experience for everyone. Now, final statements. If you want to make an impact on this project, if you want to help me with this project, there are a few things that you could do. You can sign up for the beta and participate there from the start of the Book of Fire. You can go through the videos, go through the links, tell me what works, tell me what doesn't work. Tell me how I can improve it. Tell me it's all rubbish. Tell me. It's great. Every feedback is appreciated. So I would love to know if the thing I'm building is really working out, if you have a specific pathway that led you into the fire, if there are specific things that made you the fire engineer you are today. I don't know your experience, but I would love to. So if you can share these experiences with me, I would appreciate it a lot because it will give a more complete image of what fire engineering is to the people who come into the profession. So that would, be for sure, highly beneficial. Of course, the simplest thing if you know some resources that are not mentioned in the Book of Fire, but you believe they should be mentioned, just send them to me and I'll do my best to keep the thing updated and have all the newest links to the resources. I'll, of course, have to first verify the resources, but I trust you, if you send me good things, the good things will find their way to the Book of Fire. So that would be it for this short announcement. I better go back to recording videos and building the course I will honestly share with you. I thought I'm going to build it in a week. It was literally. I've posted a LinkedIn, I thought, okay, podcast is not going to work. I need to make a better resource than it was. Aha, I need to make an online course, because what I am thinking about looks like an online course. So let's go, let's do it. I've sat down, I've recorded some videos. They were rubbish. I've rescheduled everything. I've written scripts for every module, every single lesson. I've started recording them. They were rubbish again, but a little less rubbish than before. So I've started improving. I've invested a little bit in the tech to make those more interesting than I have. This has happened. Of course, I love doing this, but enjoying Japan and I versus was more important to me. So two week hold on the whole project. Then I came back. We recorded. Now I think they are almost good to go. Some of them still need to be recorded, but it takes so much time and, yeah, time is not something I have in the surplus so, very naive voice that thought it's going to be an easy thing. But I'm very happy in what's coming out of this and seeing the things I see today that you don't see yet, you'll see on 27 November. I know it's going to be great. Also, a big thanks to JVVA for supporting me in this. Thanks to them, the thing will be provided to everyone for free, it will be maintained for years and also they've shared their experience and knowledge with me, which is priceless. So thanks Jimmy, thanks Gabriel, for supporting me in this project. So that would be it for today, not such a short announcement, but really I'm really happy to share this with you and I really look forward to learn what you think about the resources I've built. So for the one final time, the book of fire. At the book of firecom you can sign up for the waitlist and the first useful variant of that comes out 27 November. And now for the podcast for the next week. On Wednesday we're going to have a little more chilled down episode again because I expect a large number of people coming into the show from outside of fire for another reason that you'll learn next week and I need to take the opportunity to share with a lot of general public what fire science is. So there will be a more general episode on Wednesday, but I promise to deliver fire science to you next week as well. And I'm gonna post the second episode on Friday, which will be a normal fire science show episode with hardcore fire science for hardcore science enthusiasts. So exciting week ahead. A lot of work in front of me today and in upcoming days. So, yeah, let's stay in touch. Thank you, bye.