FireNZ Magazine - September 2025

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Fire Protection Association

New Zealand

Private Box 302372, North Harbour Auckland 0751

Phone: + 64 9 414 4450

Email: info@fpanz.org

Web: www.fpanz.org

Institution of Fire Engineers

New Zealand Branch PO Box 3961

Wellington 6140

Email: secretary@ife.org.nz

Web: www.ife.org.nz

Society of Fire Protection Engineers

New Zealand Chapter

PO Box 91511, Victoria Street West Auckland 1142

Phone: + 64 9 308 7030

Email: secretary@sfpe.org.nz

Web: www.sfpe.org.nz

INDEX

FireNZ welcomes articles and letters from our readership. These can cover any aspect of fire protection, fire engineering (performance and design), legislation, fire safety practice, fire industry product development, fire fighting operations, techniques, equipment and case studies and technical news. All articles will be assessed by an editorial panel prior to publication who, at their discretion, reserve the right to either decline use of the article or seek amendments. Articles should inform, debate, educate and help our readership through sharing of both knowledge and expertise.

Themes for the upcoming magazine production will be promoted in advance of editorial committee deadlines to ensure all contributors are able to meet the final magazine delivery timelines.

The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the Fire Protection Association New Zealand, Institution of Fire Engineers (NZ Branch) or the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (NZ Chapter).

Articles are published in good faith but FireNZ Magazine and its agents do not warrant the accuracy or currency of any information or data contained herein. FireNZ magazine and its agents do not accept any responsibility or liability whatsoever with regard to the material in this publication.

Material in FireNZ magazine is subject to Copyright. This publication may not be reproduced in printed or electronic form without the permission of the publisher.

FireNZ Magazine is published by DEFSEC Media Limited on behalf of: Fire Protection Association New Zealand, Society of Fire Protection Engineers (NZ Chapter), Institution of Fire Engineers (NZ Branch).

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About this product

XFLAM Insulated Panels are high performance, insurer endorsed, innovative products for fire resistant panelised construction. With a syntactic thermoset foam core, XFLAM has excellent fire properties, mechanical strength, superior thermal insulation, low toxicity and are completely recyclable.

XFLAM panels are specifically manufactured for roofing, internal and external walls, ceilings and architectural facades, with many accreditations including NCC Group 1 and AS1530.4 FRL’s, all critical characteristics for meeting the performance requirements of today’s building code.

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Bondor NZ’s Volcore panel range consists of a non-combustible, fire-resistant, mineral wool core.

About this product

When absolute fire performance is a must, BONDOR NZ’s Volcore insulated panel gets the job done and is best suited for extreme, high risk environments such as multi storey developments, data centres and plant rooms.

BONDOR NZ Volcore has a mineral wool core manufactured from Basalt Rock, which achieves high Fire Resistance Levels (FRL) and is non-combustible, as required to C2D10 of the National construction code.

Volcore also has the added benefits of sound absorption with significant acoustic ratings and is thermally efficient with R Values up to 5.0. It is the market leader in fire rated insulated panels suitable for facades, cladding and exterior walls.

Project: Whakatohea Mussels (Opotiki) Limited

Core: XFLAM Profile: Flat

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President’s Message

Fire Protection Association of New Zealand (FPANZ) President Justin McEntyre writes that although change is constant, continuous improvement means embracing new technologies and methodologies – and being willing to challenge ourselves.

As we gather for FireNZ 2025, I am reminded how quickly our industry continues to evolve. The conversations we are having today are not the same ones we were having even five years ago. Regulation, liability, and public expectation are shifting. The challenge—and the opportunity—is how we as an industry choose to respond.

I was reminded recently that positive change always comes from within the industry, not regulators. Regulators provide controls, however, it is the industry collectively that delivers positive change in deliverables and behaviour.

Designing Better Through Change

The recent regulatory changes and the sharpening of proportionate liability should not be viewed as a burden. They are a trigger to design better. They force all of us consultants, contractors, engineers, regulators to raise our game.

Cost-cutting, lowest-commondenominator design and a “just enough” attitude are no longer acceptable. We owe it to building owners, insurers, and most importantly the people who occupy these buildings, to design solutions that are robust, resilient, and future proof.

Risk, Responsibility, and Solutions

Fire safety cannot be addressed by ticking the box of an Acceptable Solution. That is only one pathway, and it often delivers the bare minimum. The best outcomes come when we consider all risks and all possible solutions— weighing performance, buildability, cost, and long-term resilience.

This requires courage to move beyond “the way it’s always been done,” and collaboration across disciplines to design smarter and safer buildings.

Global Outreach and Knowledge Sharing

New Zealand is not an island when it comes to fire safety. The risks we face, the innovations we adopt, and the lessons learned from international tragedies are all part of a global conversation.

Through partnerships with organisations such as the Fire Protection Association Australia (FPAA), Firestop Contractors International Association (FCIA), National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), and by contributing to global knowledge exchanges, FPANZ is helping ensure that New Zealand benefits from international best practice. In return, we are also sharing our own expertise and leadership back into the global community.

This outreach is not just about standards and frameworks—it is about building long-term resilience for our built environment and future-proofing New Zealand’s fire safety sector.

Continuous Improvement and the Next Generation

No industry stands still, and ours is no exception. Continuous improvement must be in our DNA. That means embracing new materials, technologies, and methodologies, but also being willing to challenge our own habits and biases.

At the same time, we have a responsibility to develop the next generation—engineers, contractors,

Justin McEntyre, FPANZ President

and inspectors who will carry this industry forward. Mentoring, training, and investing in people is not optional—it’s essential.

Looking Ahead

FireNZ has always been about more than technical papers and exhibitors stands. It is about community.

It’s about raising the bar together, challenging each other, and leaving with fresh ideas to put into practice.

I encourage you to make the most of the sessions, the networking, and the chance to stand back and think differently about our work.

Enjoy the conference.

CEO’s Message

FPANZ CEO Scott Lawson writes that this year’s FireNZ Conference & Exhibition is bigger than ever, attracting presenters and exhibitors from across New Zealand and internationally – a fitting highlight to the Association’s 50th anniversary year.

Welcome to this year’s FireNZ Magazine. In February 2025, the Fire Protection Association of New Zealand (FPANZ) commemorated its 50th anniversary. Over the past five decades, the Association has grown significantly and now serves as a prominent representative entity for the fire protection industry.

This milestone presents an ideal occasion to recognise those who have contributed to FPANZ’s advancement, whether in its formative years or in more recent times. Additional historical insights, a review of the Association’s evolution, and future perspectives for members and the sector are detailed in a special article found on page 14.

FireNZ is an annual event and currently ranks among the largest specialist trade conferences within this field in New Zealand. Originally a one-day event with no tradeshow, it has expanded to three days with over 60 trade booths and now also attracts subject matter experts from around the world. Given New Zealand’s geographic position, such international participation necessitates considerable dedication and planning.

This year, FireNZ features a substantial contingent of international speakers from Australia, United States and the United Kingdom alongside our great local professionals. The event maintains a strong commitment to welcoming new presenters from New Zealand and encourages them to introduce topics and participate in future conferences.

In addition to its three streams of educational and product sessions, FireNZ provides extensive networking opportunities. Attendees can interact

with suppliers, engage with both local and international speakers, deliberate on current issues with peers, and attend the FireNZ awards as well as a variety of social functions included with registration.

The expanding scale of FireNZ dictates that only venues capable of accommodating large conferences are suitable, which will likely confine future events to Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch. As a result, venue selection and logistical arrangements now must be planned and secured two to three years ahead.

The FireNZ tradeshow affords a unique annual opportunity to connect with principal product suppliers in a single location. This focus guarantees participants remain informed about emerging trends and products, facilitating engagement with suppliers that would otherwise require considerable time and travel across New Zealand. Exhibitors play a crucial role in the success of FireNZ, and attendees are strongly encouraged to visit all supplier stands to discover offerings that may provide valuable insight into the latest industry developments.

As FireNZ continues its growth trajectory, participant feedback is welcomed to support ongoing improvements and to ensure the event remains aligned with the needs of the fire protection community here in New Zealand. On behalf of the FireNZ committee its partners, FPANZ, IFE and SFPE, we extend a warm welcome to all delegates attending this year’s conference. Your involvement is key to making this event successful.

Have a great time.

Scott Lawson, FPANZ CEO

President’s Message

New Zealand

Greg North, President, NZ Chapter Society of Fire Protection Engineers, provides an update on SFPE activities and opportunities for members to get involved and help shape the future of the sector.

As we gather for FireNZ 2025, and as SFPE NZ celebrates its 30th anniversary, it is pleasing to reflect on a year where our fire engineering community built upon last year’s initiatives and tackled new challenges. Progress has occurred nationally and we’ve delivered important new technical guidance for practitioners. The SFPE NZ Chapter has been active supporting our members and strengthening ties across the industry. Looking ahead, we face ongoing pressures and regulatory changes, but also exciting opportunities to advance fire safety in innovative, sustainable ways. Below I highlight some key developments and the outlook moving forward.

Building Code & regulatory developments

A comprehensive review of New Zealand’s building fire safety regulations is now well underway, targeting updates at the Building Code level and supporting documents. Many expert groups (including SFPE NZ) have currently contributed to this work to help shape potential changes. The aim is to resolve long-standing issues of clarity and conflicts in fire safety rules.

The Code review presents a huge opportunity for positive change, and SFPE NZ continues to encourage members to get involved as the process moves towards developing draft changes over coming months.

SFPE NZ provided feedback on the development of the first edition of the Building Product Specifications, which was released by MBIE in July 2025. The Specification, and the associated changes to the MBIE acceptable solutions and verification methods documents, support the government’s

plan to make it easier to use overseas building products and introduces a regular update cycle for the Building Code system.

In August 2025, the Government unveiled what it called “the biggest building consent system reform in decades.” This reform is aimed at streamlining the building consenting process and reducing bottlenecks. SFPE NZ will be watching the proposals as they are detailed and we will advocate for good fire safety outcomes.

From January 2026, the assessment of a Chartered Professional Engineer (CPEng) will change with the introduction of new rules. The CPEng Rules have been updated to include Subpart 7 – Classes.

The new classes will allow for more tailored assessments for specific areas of engineering (such as fire engineering) where there is significant public safety risk, a regulatory need, or industry readiness. They will provide greater clarity and accountability for high-risk engineering activities. Given Professional Practice and Leadership is a core value of SFPE NZ, we are proactively involved with Engineering NZ to define the details of the Fire Engineering Class.

Advancements in Fire Engineering Guidance

First published in 2011, the fire engineering community now has the updated (Version 2) compliance documentation guide Practice Note 22. The original publication has been the go-to reference for demonstrating the implementation of the fire design in the overall building design documentation, including improving communication and coordination between all disciplines, and defining responsibilities.

SFPE NZ together with members of the stakeholder working group supported Engineering New Zealand over the past two years overhauling the guidance to reflect current practice, new research, and lessons learned from a decade of use.

Following on from the successful publication of the Fire Design Guide for Hospitals in July 2024, SFPE NZ design leadership continued with the publication of the draft supplement to this guide focusing on existing hospitals. The supplement helps practitioners retrofit or upgrade older hospital buildings in line with the new guide, clarifying what is “reasonably practicable” to improve in existing facilities. Together, the design guide and its supplement raises the bar for healthcare fire safety and provide consistency in how we approach these critical buildings.

In recognition of the industry interest in the topic in recent years, and the absence of specific New Zealand guidance on the topic, SFPE NZ and our industry partners are currently developing an NZ-appropriate fire safety guide for the design, construction, operation and fire-fighting of buildings containing Electric Vehicles.

Greg North, President, NZ Chapter SFPE

The guidance will build on the details found in existing international guidance/standards, current published research, and existing guidance from Emergency Services. It will help fill the void of information that currently exists within NZ and create a framework/benchmark for ongoing discussions. The new guidance will seek to:

• Highlight the fire risks of EVs against our current NZ fire regulatory environment

• Provide suggestions for managing this fire risk in new or existing buildings

• Be a source for those seeking additional information on this topic

SFPE Chapter Activities and Community

A core part of SFPE NZ’s mission is to foster the next generation of fire engineers, and this year we have further strengthened our ties with academia. We continue our close partnership with the University of Canterbury’s Fire Engineering Programme, providing industry feedback on the curriculum. In 2025 we continued our sponsorship

of student project awards for outstanding fire engineering research at UC.

SFPE NZ members have supported the development of students through providing mentoring connections, supervision of projects, and industry presentations. I’d like to thank the many SFPE members who donate their time to teach, mentor, or supervise students – your efforts are making a difference.

Over the last 12 months, SFPE NZ has hosted or co-hosted numerous successful and well-attended events on topical and emerging issues. These events draw a wide audience from consultants, councils, and FENZ, and really help spread current best practices. On the more social side, our regional branches have organised some fantastic site visits and member engagement sessions around the country.

One of the things that we have been focusing on is membership engagement and delivering value to the Members. People should have been seeing quite a lot more communications from us this year. We’ve been publishing regular newsletters this year that highlight what the executive does, what’s going

on in the industry, and publicising our ongoing webinars and other opportunities to connect.

Our many working groups have been busy focusing on membership, professionalism, leadership and many other initiatives. As a key body for fire engineering and fire safety professionals, we are always seeking new members and strongly welcome the feedback we receive from our members.

2026 will continue to include plenty of engagement within our membership and with new members, including by our regional representatives who’ve been very active in driving local activities.

Get in touch with your regional rep and let’s create even more connections through more activities. Remember that our next AGM will occur soon after FireNZ and anybody is welcome to stand for roles in the executive. You can make change and influence the industry, and we’d love to see you stand up and put yourself forward.

Lastly, I wish all presenters, sponsors, exhibitors, and delegates that very best for Fire NZ 2025! Enjoy the conference – I hope you find it informative, inspiring and engaging.

President’s Message

Institution

of Fire Engineers (IFE) NZ branch President Scott Lanauze writes that significant processes occurring within the building industry are creating a greater awareness of fire safety, and IFE is playing a leading role.

It is my pleasure on behalf of the Institution of Fire Engineers (IFE) NZ branch to welcome you to FireNZ 2025. We welcome you all to a highly collaborative and participatory conference showcasing the fire industry and its professional networks.

Our collaboration with the Fire Protection Association New Zealand and the Society of Fire Protection Engineers in bringing this conference to life ensures everyone within the fire industry has an opportunity to collaborate, share ideas and promote innovation. In recent times, our ability to collaborate and lead discussions with key stakeholders relating to building design, construction and operation has ensured our common voice has been heard.

The IFE is a global professional membership body for those in the fire sector that seek to increase their knowledge, professional recognition and understanding of fire through a global discourse.

Founded in 1918, the IFE has been instrumental in shaping a future world that is safer from fire. Our membership provides for over 11,000 fire sector professionals supported by regular CPD activities, conferences, and events.

Significant processes occurring within the building industry are creating a greater awareness of fire safety. The legal proceedings of the 2023 Loafers Lodge fire in Wellington have once again alerted us to the potential effects of fire in buildings with no sprinklers, frequent false alarms, and blocked exits.

The Building Code fire safety review, initial feedback of which was submitted late in 2024, highlights the importance of ensuring building

rules keep people safe and keep pace with changes in how we design, construct and use buildings. Proposed amendments for Cabinet consideration in early 2026 will focus on clearer language, better evacuation standards (especially for people with disabilities and boarding house occupants), practical hazard mitigation, and alignment with modern firefighting practices.

Through our professional associations, we can support these reforms by providing expert input, strengthening inspection standards, and promoting mandatory safety systems. Rigorous compliance checks, upskilling, and community engagement will promote the visibility of the fire industry in public forums to build credibility in this area.

IFE in New Zealand continues to partner with our associated agencies in aid of educational opportunities. Our examination programme continues to offer focused educational opportunities to build industry accredited qualifications in various sector organisations. IFE Global has continued to develop online examinations to meet the need of its international branches, ensuring a less restrictive process to engage candidates.

Our regular one-day Firefighting operations for Fire Engineers workshop offers fire engineers and people who work in fire related industries the opportunity to gain a better understanding of fire and smoke behaviour and firefighting techniques by involvement in a series of real fire simulations, gaining first-hand experience of real fires in building enclosures (including fire initiation and development) fire and smoke spread, flashover, the use of firefighting

equipment, and search and rescue techniques (more information is on the IFE website).

Globally, the IFE in New Zealand continues to be well represented, with immediate Past President Jason Hill leading the International General Assembly. Jason also holds a co-opted Trustee Director position on the Board of Directors, ensuring that the New Zealand voice is continuously provided to the IFE Board of Directors.

The IFE Asia Pacific sub-forum has also resumed after a hiatus, ensuring local branches in Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Fiji, Australia and New Zealand remain connected to support its members and stakeholders.

Our Branch Council continues to support our cause in NZ through supporting initiatives and activities to local benefit. Thank you to those on the Branch Council for your energy and commitment to delivering these outcomes.

Alongside our partner organisations, we look forward to hosting you at FireNZ in Auckland and wish you a successful conference.

Scott Lanauze, Institution of Fire Engineers NZ branch President

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FPANZ celebrates 50 years!

The Fire Protection Association New Zealand (FPANZ) celebrates 50 years of providing information, services and education to the fire protection industry and the community.

It was the year in which the Vietnam War came to an end, Spanish dictator Francisco Franco died, Microsoft was founded, the film Jaws was released, and Muhummad Ali triumphed in the Thrilla in Manila.

In New Zealand, it was the year that the Waitangi Tribunal was established, Robert Muldoon led the National Party to a landslide victory, the Maori land march walked 1,000km to Parliament, Close to Home aired as NZ’s first TV soap opera, and Footrot Flats made its debut.

It was also the year in which the New Zealand Fire Protection Association came into being, following the new Fire Service Act 1975 , which also led to the amalgamation of local authority fire boards into the national New Zealand Fire Service.

NZFPA was established as a not-for-profit member organisation and the national body for fire safety, its mission to provide a professional forum and be the unified voice of the fire protection industry by drawing on its members’ expertise and collective knowledge to reduce the impact of fire in New Zealand.

Wormald acted as midwife for the birth of the Association, establishing a framework for its operation, bringing other businesses to the party, and offering its senior personnel as early office bearers, including founding Chairperson John Slater.

“Slater was good with government departments,” industry veteran and subsequent Chairperson Ian Makgill told FireNZ. “So they put him in Wellington, gave him an office on the Terrace, and a fridge, and a case of whiskey.”

1980s

When Slater resigned in 1980, Tim Flack, who was an inspection officer with the Insurance Council succeeded him, and the office shifted to Auckland. Brian Hill followed as chair in the mid-80s and at the height of Rogernomics.

The radical economic reforms implemented by the Labour Government between 1984 and 1988 transformed the country’s heavily regulated economy into one of the world’s most open, resulting in deregulation of financial markets, privatisation of state-owned enterprises, removal of subsidies, and the introduction of a GST.

A casualty of the reforms was training and apprenticeships, with apprentice numbers declining dramatically in the late 1980s. “When they turned around and cut down apprenticeships, I think New Zealand as a whole suffered,” recalls former FPANZ Chairperson Chris Mak.

“The Fire Protection Association is not a training organisation, but we also look at opportunities, how we can improve industry, how we can promote training and increase the awareness of industry of issues and problems and to get what we’re doing correct.”

Meanwhile, the publication of new standards drove the Association’s activities, with FPANZ contributing significantly to the development and drafting of standards that led to major improvements to the protection of life and property.

1987 saw the publication of the NZS 4541 Automatic Fire Sprinkler Systems standard, which specifies the design, performance, installation and maintenance of automatic fire sprinkler systems in buildings or structures. It was a major change from the previous provisional standard NZS 4541P from 1972.

FPANZ Life Members John Powell and Simon Malthus, who had both worked for Wormald, are particularly respected for their work in contributing to the development of NZS 4541 and its associated documents, including NZS 4515 and NZS 4517.

1990s

The Association’s continued growth in the 1990s was driven by the passing of the Building Act 1991 and the introduction of the Building Code in 1992, which introduced a performance-based building control system to New Zealand. This “light-handed” framework replaced a previous prescriptive system by focusing on how buildings should perform rather than specifying how to construct them. The provisions that came to be known as the six “C” clauses of the Code set out the performance requirements related to fire safety.

The New Zealand Chapter of the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE) was formed in 1994 in response to new performance-based fire safety legislation, which created new opportunities for fire engineering professionals.

The late John Fraser OBE was one of the drivers behind forming SFPE(NZ) and as a Life Member of FPA, ensured that both organisations worked together collaboratively.

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The passing of the Industry Training Act 1992 saw the establishment of Industry Training Organisations (ITOs). The Act set up the framework for ITOs to manage training and set standards for their respective industries, replacing the traditional apprenticeship system with new training agreements between employers, trainees, and the ITO.

It was part of a broader shift in approach to vocational education, which saw a market-based model devolving more responsibility to industries for worker training. FPANZ became a key contributor in this space, working with the government and ITOs to ensure the delivery of high quality, relevant, training and education pathways.

The early 1990s also saw NZ Fire Protection Contractors’ Association merge with the New Zealand Fire Protection Association, becoming what we know today as the Fire Protection Association New Zealand.

The latter part of the decade saw FPANZ take a key role in the phase-out of ozone-depleting fire suppression gas Halon under the Montreal Protocol, which banned its production in 1994. Ultimately, work undertaken by John Fraser, Ian Makgill, and Scott Lawson to responsibly withdraw Halon from service and have it exported to Australia for destruction would take place over more than two decades.

FPANZ celebrates 50 years!

Post-2000

Post-2000, says Ian Makgill, under such Presidents as Kevin Kennedy, Keith Blind, and Chris Mak and the sustained leadership of CEO Scott Lawson, the FPA’s financial model improved through training and the evolution of the FireNZ Conference & Exhibition, enhancing the Association’s profitability and relevance to industry.

Following early iterations, FPANZ saw value in reaching out to IFE New Zealand Branch and SFPE New Zealand Chapter to collaborate on FireNZ, forming a partnership to turn the event into a calendar highlight truly representative of the industry.

Unsurprisingly, the FireNZ Conference & Exhibition evolved to become the leading annual event for the fire industry, and recognised internationally for its role in providing a platform for in-depth discussion on key and emerging issues, regulatory change, international dynamics, and the latest fire-related research. Its attendee numbers have continued to reach new heights.

By 2012, with Keith Blind as CEO and Scott Lawson joining as a contractor, the Association looked to reinvent itself, launching a restructure of the organisation to reinvigorate the industry, reconnect with its members in a more meaningful and regular manner, and position the organisation financially to better meet the needs of its members.

With those changes, there were developments in how the Association communicated with its members, including the introduction of a monthly newsletter. The FireNZ conference was amped up a notch. By 2015-16, the momentum of change continued, resulting in a better profile with government agencies (MBIE, FENZ, Standards NZ), local councils, and other stakeholder organisations, such as BRANZ. The Association moved to provide more informal training to members through the Get it Right seminars, which are still running today.

Meanwhile, interest in passive fire protection had surged following the highlighting of significant problems with the effective design and implementation of PFP systems. This was amplified by increased awareness of risks following international incidents, including the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017.

By 2018, FPANZ looked to how it would service a growing list of new members from the passive side of the industry, with Paul Ryan and Justin McEntyre working to successfully integrate the passive sector with the pre-existing fire protection community.

Late 2018 saw the establishment of the Fire Protection Charitable Trust by FPANZ as a separate, independent charitable entity, The Trust became a conduit to collect funds from industry to help fund the development of fire protection standards following the government’s dismantling of the Standards Council, and placing on industry the burden of funding the development of most standards.

Restructure and related initiatives had reduced operational expenses and placed the Association in a strong financial position, enabling a renewed focus on planning new training initiatives for the industry. Then Covid-19 hit.

Post-Covid

With the onset of Covid, the Association – along with other peak industry bodies – faced a new set of largely unprecedented challenges resulting from lockdowns and other restrictions. The Fire NZ Conference & Exhibition went into forced hiatus, and other activities moved online, making collaboration a challenge.

“Covid sent us backwards,” said Chris Mak, whose presidency of the Association straddled the pandemic years. “Where we were looking at developments and strategy prior to Covid, we’re now still recovering post-Covid, but we are working with it.”

“We had to keep the organisation afloat,” Scott Lawson said to FireNZ Magazine. “So many plans had to be put on hold and we had to figure out whether members would be able to continue their support for the organisation financially and in terms of resource. We weathered it as best we could, but it changed our mentality in terms of developing plans for the future that we could pivot in case something like Covid happened again.”

According to Mak, the Association has evolved to punch well above its weight. With a complement of two full time staff, the organisation promotes strong voluntarism among its membership to provide the many hands needed to implement initiatives.

A hallmark of the contribution of volunteers has been the progressive establishment of special interest groups (SIGs) within the Association. Made up by members with shared interests in specific areas, these forums collaborate on technical issues, develop industry guidelines, review training

and standards, offer expert advice to regulatory bodies like MBIE, and improve the quality and consistency of products and services within the sector.

“What has been very apparent for me over the years that I’ve been involved in the association is the strength of our reputation among the the key players, including the government, the regulators, and across the ditch in Australia, That strength has been built by a lot of good contributions by a lot of good people over a long time,” current FPANZ President Justin McEntyre told FireNZ Magazine.

“When I’m reflecting on those people who have provided a lot of service over the years, I’m very conscious of the need to make sure that all of that’s carried forward, to build on the good success that’s been established over the last 50 years and keep moving forward in positive way into the future,” said McEntyre, who succeeded Chris Mak as President in late 2023.

Volunteering, says Mak, is a two-way street. “You get out of an association, what you put into the association, so if you help them grow the industry, if you’re teaching or presenting on things that you’re strong in, you’re learning more about your strengths.

Looking ahead

According to McEntyre, one of the biggest challenges facing the Association is the transfer of knowledge to current and future generations of fire professionals, and the equipping of professionals for the future.

“Everyone’s struggling with the fact that a lot of the knowledge within the industry is reaching the latter part of its career, and it’s not being replaced, and we’ve probably been a bit stuck in the mud about it, wondering when things will return to the days when we had time and cadetships and things like that. But I think the truth is that the future is going to be nothing like the past.”

“The next stage is how we help our members and our industry to navigate labour changes and software changes, emerging technologies and things like that, as it’s going to be a key role for the Association as we, as we look to the future.”

Over the past year, says Scott Lawson, the Association has started this process by looking at what its large cohort of small business members’ needs. “A lot of these need help how to run their own business, HR and recruitment matters, insurance, and other topics not specifically to do with fire,” said Scott.

Looking ahead, Scott foresees the need to keep one eye on bread and butter activities, such as standards updates, and another on evolving the Association’s strategy to ensure it remains best positioned to deliver for its members and the community.

“The standards are the foundation for what our members do in the industry and so they know what will be required of them into the future,” noted Scott.

“We’ve achieved quite a lot but the Association does need to continue to evolve. This means taking care not to waste resources in sudden strategy shifts but rather to gradually evolve as the market changes and as our members’ needs change.”

“While we are strong financially and can therefore in a great position to act on strategy, the Board is very committed to making sure that before we spend we’ve done the due diligence we should.”

“On the occasion of our 50th anniversary, I’d like to acknowledge everyone who has contributed along the way,” concluded Scott. “While there’s too many names to mention, I would like to recognise everyone who has volunteeredtheir time as board members and council members and in SIGs and other initiatives over the years. You have made FPANZ what it is today. Thank you.”

Pro~Seal™ – Raising the Standard in Intumescent Sealing

Within the fire protection market, the weakest link isn’t always the intumescent itself — the products applied alongside it need to preform too.

Have you encountered issues with:

• Solvent entrapment & resulting blistering

• Rain damage

• Solvent softening from finish coats

• Finish coat incompatibility

Altex Coatings Ltd has addressed these challenges Pro~Seal™ , a nextgeneration single-pack sealer designed specifically for use over Altex Coatings Ltd approved single pack intumescent coatings.

Proven Reliability that Protects and Performs

Pro~Seal™ is engineered to:

• Protect Against Moisture Ingress – steel can be stored outdoors with improved weather resistance during the construction process.

• Promote Full Intumescent Cure –solvents trapped in the intumescent layer can safely escape, ensuring the required Shore D50 hardness is achieved.

• Mitigate Critical Risks – including blistering, rain damage, finish coat softening, and incompatibility with solvent or water-borne topcoats.

The result is a more reliable, longerlasting fireproofing system that gives confidence to both specifiers and applicators.

Features That Drive Confidence

• Fast Drying – dust-free in ~30 minutes.

• Construction-Phase Durability – can remain uncoated in most circumstances until project completion. Up to six months in exterior environments.

• Application Flexibility – suitable for brush, roller, or spray.

• Topcoat – compatible with twocomponent polyurethane and a variety of other finish coats.

Why Choose Pro~Seal™?

• Dust-free in 30 minutes

• Can be left un top-coated during construction phase

• Brush, roller, or spray application

• Compatible with multiple topcoat types

• Performs in low temperatures

• Prevents solvent entrapment in intumescent coating

Pro~Seal™ – Protecting steel, supporting intumescents, and raising the bar for fireproofing reliability.

• Low-Temperature Curing –maintains performance in challenging conditions.

Setting a New Benchmark

Where all other coatings fail, Pro~Seal™ delivers a resilient finish. By enabling proper intumescent cure and offering robust moisture protection, it extends the service life and reliability of passive fire protection systems. For specifiers and applicators, this means fewer call-backs, greater project flexibility, and assurance that fire protection performance and aesthetics remains uncompromised.

Pro~Seal™ isn’t just a sealer—it’s the essential protective coating that ensures intumescent coatings perform as designed in the event of a fire.

Modified acrylic sealer

Pro~Seal

Wind turbine fire protection

Wind turbines are increasingly generating electricity from New Zealand’s’ ridges and skylines.

Depending on factors such as site location, access and size, and accounting for turbine cost, foundation and civil works, tower construction, transport and installation, electrical infrastructure and planning and permits, a single installed 3.5MW turbine can require a total investment of $6-$10 million.

On top of this, yearly ongoing operational costs are $50,000$100,000 per MW per year.

And while blade failure is the leading cause of turbine destruction, fire is a close second. It is estimated a wind farm can expect to face one to two fires over the course of its operational lifetime. (It is estimated that 0.3-0.5 fire incidents occur per 1000 wind turbines every year).

Turbine fires are typically ignited by:

1. Lightning strikes

2. Electrical malfunction or mechanical failure

3. Maintenance activities

Ninety percent of these fires start in the nacelle – the housing at the top of a tower which contains the generator, gearbox and other mechanical parts such as high and low speed shafts and brake. The nacelle itself, typically catches fire for the same reasons as other heavy machinery.

• Most commonly, components inside the turbine fail and generate heat or sparks, igniting flammable materials such as plastic, resins, fibreglass and hydraulic lubricants

• Turbine transformers which convert energy into the appropriate voltage for the electrical grid either sparks or arc flashes due to electrical faults – which can lead to a fire

This means, given turbines’ establishment cost, and typically significant damage, downtime and other economic losses if a fire eventuates, that fire detection and protection systems are an extremely cost-effective, money and saved-time cost avoiding element of all turbine farms. It should be noted that wind turbine fires tend to cause losses equal to or about its original cost.

Fundamental protection

The fundamental properties required for active fire protection is an intelligent fire detection system (such as the Pertronic F220 panel connected to point-type smoke and heat detectors), linked to a appropriate suppression system.

In this case active fire protection requires:

• Instant fire detection

• Instant triggering of fire alarm systems

• Quick acting fire suppression systems

There are a number of ways to subdue a turbine fire – all of them with their pluses and minuses.

1. Water-based systems – tricky to either store and/or pump water in or to the nacelle

2. Carbon dioxide – requires the nacelle to be airtight to work effectively

3. Aerosol-based – very fine solid particles in a gaseous form

4. Clean agent – inert gas or chemical that is significantly more environmentally friendly than other options

While adding fire detection and suppression systems to individual turbines is an extra cost, the installation of Pertronic systems, such as in the recently commissioned Queensland Macintyre Wind Farm is a recognition that replacing a fire-destroyed turbine is a much greater capital and opportunity cost than the operational expense and peace of mind that comes from protecting what is already in place.

Any wind farm needs both sophisticated fire detection products and suppression technologies to provide the best return on a considerable investment.

Equally, access to the expertise which can inform and guide the best system(s) for wind farm should be high on wind farm operators’ requirements. Pertronic prides itself on having the technologies and the expertise to turbo-charge wind turbine fire protection – talk to us today.

Advanced automatic fire detection for wind turbines

The same Pertronic technology that detects fire in commercial buildings, motorway tunnels and underground railways, also protects wind turbines. Now operational at Queensland’s MacIntyre Wind Farm.

Active, networked fire protection

Up to 160 Pertronic F220 panels can be networked, observed and controlled from a central point. Panels detect fire instantly and quickly trigger alarms and fire suppression systems, including:

• Aerosol-based

• Clean agent

• Carbon dioxide

• Water-based

• Wind turbine shut-down

www.pertronic.nz

Turbine

image via Freepik

Thermal imaging provides earliest warning for waste and recycling facilities

Fire Protection Technologies integrates thermal imaging systems with fire-fighting monitors to deliver early detection and automated response before hotspots become flashpoints.

Flame detection, linear heat detection and spark detection and suppression systems are proven technologies to protect waste transfer stations, waste stockpiles and recycling facilities. Thermal imaging is now playing a key role because of its early warning ability.

Working environments in waste and recycling facilities can be challenging. If biological processes exist inside the waste, the movement of oxygen and air over the surface of the pile or bunker causes oxidation which heats up the waste This heat is transferred both inwards and outwards but the heat that travels inwards can build-up within the pile and lead to the formation of a high temperature hotspot.

This hotspot will then continue to spread until it reaches a point on the surface. Here it will interact with oxygen in the air and this can lead to actual ignition of the pile or bunker.

These fires can typically escalate quite quickly given the combustible

nature of waste, which can be anything from tyres, used oil and green waste to woods, solvents and plastics.

Thermal imaging detection systems use infrared cameras, coupled with a software package, to analyse thermographic images to detect any hot spots before they ignite. In fact, they provide the earliest warning possible of that type of heating phenomena above and beyond what other technology and the human eye can do.

Thermal cameras can be fixed or mounted as a pan-tilt arrangement to automatically monitor a defined area, continually measuring the surface temperatures. Hot-spot differentiation prevents false alarms caused by other heat sources such as hot exhausts from plant machinery or motors.

This system can also be directly integrated with fire-fighting monitors to automatically attack a fire incident.

The cameras can target a hot spot that’s been detected, and monitors can directly deploy water or fire-fighting

mediums to the area, eliminating the need for human intervention. The systems are completely customisable depending on the environment, including the type of waste, external influences, and site size.

Fire Protection Technologies conducts a site survey to determine the appropriate camera layout. Ideally, the resultant layout will provide 3D coverage of the facility and area to be monitored.

Technical support, design and engineering assistance is provided during the development, installation and commissioning of a project.

Fire Protection Technologies focuses on unique and special hazard applications with expertise in providing design and engineering solutions. Part of the company ethos is to provide every solution for special hazard problems.

For more information, visit: www. fireprotection.com.au

FIRE SOLUTIONS FOR WASTE FACILITIES

FLAME DETECTION

• Electro-optical sensors identify radiated energy, flicker signature and flame distinguishing algorithms.

• Activate connected alarm or suppression systems, such as automatic water cannons or deluge systems.

THERMAL IMAGING DETECTION

• Early Fire Detection: Detects sources of fire without contact by detecting critical temperature thresholds.

• Surveillance & recognition of spontaneous fires on conveyors, waste transfer stations & stockpiles.

FOAM DELIVERY SYSTEMS

• Hydraulically driven water and foam oscillating monitors with wide swiveling ranges and adjustable flow rate.

• Used for areas with large distances between accessible points where risk of exposure to fire is severe.

Sad passing of two industry pillars

The fire industry mourns the passing in 2025 of two greats. Richard Brand and Robert Peart both significantly contributed to Society of Fire Protection Engineers NZ Chapter and to the development of the industry generally.

Richard Brand

Richard Brand sadly passed away on 3rd June 2025. Richard was an Honorary Member of the SFPE New Zealand Chapter and a Past President. He was a vocal and influential participant in Chapter activities and the fire engineering profession in general.

Together with founding members of the New Zealand Chapter, Paul Clements, John Fraser and partnering with Andy Buchanan and Cliff Barnett he co-presented at the five-day Fire Engineering Building Design course at University of Auckland in 1992, which effectively kick-started the establishment of a formal fire engineering profession in New Zealand.

He authored the chapter on ‘Mechanical smoke movement’ in the New Zealand Fire Engineering Design Guide 1994 1st edition and 2000 2nd edition. Richard was

strongly influential in changing the Acceptable Solutions fire resistance ratings to recognise the need for a differentiated ‘Property rating’.

Richard was principal fire engineer for some of Auckland’s iconic buildings: Sky City Casino and Sky City Grand Hotel, Sky Tower, the Maritime Museum and the Vero Centre office building in Shortland Street.

Robert Peart

We are deeply saddened to let you know that Robert Peart passed away 4th July after a relatively short battle with cancer. Robert continued to work with passion in fire engineering until a few months ago.

He was a long-serving fire engineer with Norman Disney Young in their Auckland office. He served on the SFPE NZ Chapter Executive Committee for four years and spent many more years contributing to Chapter activities through work on design guides and practice advice notes.

He will be fondly remembered for his quiet yet forceful participation in discussion at the inperson monthly Chapter meetings (held before Covid lockdowns stopped all that).

Robert was a strong advocate for coordinated and integrated design, especially between fire engineering and fire protection systems and associated building services. He

was passionate about functional fire systems commissioning at the end of a construction project.

A couple of notable projects he worked on include the awardwinning Te Uru Waitākere Contemporary Art Gallery and as a member of the NDY team delivering fire engineering for the massive and complex International Convention Centre in Auckland. We will miss Robert dearly.

The original version of this article was published in the SFPE New Zealand May/June 2025 Newsletter, and subsequently in the FPANZ July 2025 Industry Update.

New Zealand

Beyond the Tick Box - Tackling

False Positives in Fire Testing

Omar Saad, Market Lead, Assessments, Jensen Hughes Pacific

Fire safety is fundamental to good building design. Yet one of the biggest threats to that safety can emerge well before a building is occupied, inside the testing laboratory. When standards are misinterpreted or misapplied, products can be reported as compliant even though they may fail in real conditions. These “false positives” create hidden vulnerabilities that place occupants, firefighters, and property at risk.

Why This Matters

Reaction to fire testing is already complex. Indices, group numbers and performance classifications can be difficult to interpret, and each standard has strict limitations on the products it covers. Standards such as AS/NZS 3837, AS 1530.1–3, AS 5637.1, ISO 9705 and ISO 5660-1 define where and how testing can be applied, but misuse still happens. Similarly, applying AS 1530.4 inappropriately when assigning Fire Resistance Levels (FRL) can inflate the perceived performance of walls, dampers or doors that have never been tested at full scale.

How False Positives Arise

1. Testing outside scope: For example, AS/NZS 3837 is not valid for profiled or multilayered products, intumescent coatings, assemblies, or reflective surfaces. Testing them anyway generates results that don’t reflect real performance.

2. Minimal reporting : Standards require heat-release rate and mass-loss data, but not all observations, such as shrinking, melting or dripping, are consistently recorded. Without this context, results can appear better than reality. Adding pre and post test photos improves transparency and helps catch mistakes.

Real-World Consequences

False positives are not just a paperwork problem. They can lead to:

+ Accelerated fire spread when a “compliant” material behaves unpredictably.

+ Increased risk to firefighters relying on flawed performance assumptions.

+ Reduced evacuation time, particularly dangerous in hospitals, aged care facilities and schools.

+ High financial exposure through rectification, litigation and insurance claims.

+ Loss of trust in laboratories, standards, and regulatory processes.

+ Legal liability for certifiers if faulty reports contribute to an incident.

under AS/NZS 3837 but shrink away from flames may trigger flashover much earlier in the full scale ISO 9705 test.

Spotting Red Flags in Test Reports

Diligence at the review stage is critical. Key questions to ask:

+ Does the product fall within AS 5637.1 Clause 5.3.3 “suitable materials”?

+ If the test certificate makes reference to clause 9(n) of AS 5637.1, does this comply with Clause 5.3.3 ?

+ Are group classifications (e.g. Group 1) supported by valid test methods?

+ Do the curves, photos and observations align? A flat HRR curve despite obvious melting can indicate invalid results.

Pathways to Improvement

+ Stronger staff training on standard limitations.

+ Mandatory verification or repeat testing for borderline results.

+ Use of robust full scale methods (e.g. ISO 9705) when doubt exists.

+ Proficiency testing and inter-lab audits to benchmark consistency.

+ Conservative reporting where uncertainty remains.

+ Knowledge sharing across labs, regulators and jurisdictions to spread best practice.

Conclusion

False positives erode the integrity of the entire fire safety system. Clearer understanding of standards, rigorous reporting and ongoing validation will reduce errors and strengthen trust. Laboratories, regulators and industry stakeholders share the responsibility to ensure that every “pass” truly represents reliable performance in the real world.

Even rare cases warrant concern. Materials that perform acceptably

Fire Safety Solutions Designed For New Zealand Fire

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At Jensen Hughes, we bring global expertise with a local focus, delivering innovative fire and life safety solutions tailored to Aotearoa’s unique built environment.

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From concept to completion, we help you build safer, smarter spaces, without compromise.

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OUR SERVICES ACROSS THE PACIFIC

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Pertronic founder appointed as an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit

Pertronic Industries founder and managing director David Percy was recognised in this year’s King’s Birthday Honours List for his services to fire safety technologies, business and the community.

The latest New Zealand fire protection industry professional to be recognised under the national honours system is David Percy, who has been appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit.

David received his recognition for services to fire safety technologies, business and the community.

According to an announcement by Pertronic, David commented that “the recognition is more due to the people who continue to contribute to a business that is based on saving people’s lives.”

The ONZM citation reads:

Mr David Percy established the Lower Hutt-based business Pertronic in 1982, which has produced fire detection, alarm and warning systems since 1986.

As Pertronic grew, Mr Percy has maintained a policy of at least 17 percent of annual gross revenue being invested into Research and Development as technology advances, allowing Pertronic to remain competitive internationally and evolve with technological change over 40 years to enhance fire safety protection.

Updated versions of Pertronic’s alarm control systems developed in the 1990s continue to lead the fire alarm systems market in New Zealand. Pertronic’s products are widely used from small commercial buildings to large-scale complex facilities and infrastructure installations nationwide and in Australia.

Pertronic is now the only operational New Zealand-based manufacturer of advanced Automatic Fire Detection and Alarm Systems and exports compatible

products to Southeast Asia, the South Pacific and Australia.

Through Pertronic, he has supported STEMM education and local organisations including sport and social clubs, and businesses through the Hutt Valley Chamber of Commerce. He has served on a number of New Zealand Fire Alarm Standards Committees.

He has been recognised by fire protection associations for his contributions, as well as receiving multiple business and innovation awards. Mr Percy is an Electrical Engineer and a Fellow Member of Engineering New Zealand.

“A special well done to my friend, David Percy, named as an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the King’s Birthday Honours, for services to fire safety technologies, business and the community,” stated Chris Bishop, Minister of Housing, Minister for Infrastructure, Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, and Minister of Transport. “David is the owner of Pertronic Industries, based in the Hutt. An amazing company.”

David is no stranger to awards, having picked up FPA Australia’s Meritorious Service Award in 2021. That award recognised Pertronic’s longstanding commitment to fire protection in Australia under David’s leadership.

Stop fires before they spread.

Firestop Centre is your one-stop-shop for smart, compliant products that prevent the spread of fire. Whatever your need, we’ll have a solution, that will get you out of a heated situation.

The vital role of fire safety cables in emergency evacuations

Inhalation of the smoke and toxic gases generated in a building fire is the leading cause of fire related casualties. In order to facilitate a safe evacuation during fire situations in public buildings, it is vital to limit the generation and spread of oxidation products, and provide breathable air and good visibility for as long as possible for people to escape. This is of particular importance in hospitals, schools and aged care facilities, where the organisation of evacuations can be particularly challenging.

A critical part of a building’s infrastructure when it comes to fire is its cable network. A poorly designed system can significantly contribute to toxic smoke generation and the spread of fire from one area to the next. A well-designed system will have a much lower impact, and as part of the fire safety system, can be instrumental in the continued operation of suppression systems and smoke extraction. Whilst it may not be directly considered during specification stage, traditional electrical cables manufactured with PVC compounds will emit significant amounts of smoke and acid fumes during a fire, even if the cables themselves are flame retardant. Even in a small fire, the acid gases generated can damage other electrical equipment appreciably increasing the size of the remediation cost after the fire. A properly designed low fire hazard cable however, contains no halogen material, are equally or even more flame retardant than PVC cables, and generate a significantly lower amount of much less toxic smoke during combustion.

To minimise these risks and maximise the chances of safe evacuation, selection of the right cable type for different services is a vital consideration for specifiers and asset owners. In high density

buildings, such as hospitals, schools, and public transportation systems, where visibility and air quality are the priority to enable safe evacuation, Low Fire Hazard (LFH) cables are an ideal choice to be part of the power infrastructure. Designed with materials that have low halogen content, LFH cables minimise fire spread and reduce the emission of toxic smoke and acidic gases. Their ability to limit harmful emissions helps protect human lives, making them a reliable solution for safety-conscious industries and environments.

Even in buildings that do not have high human occupancy, such as data centres, the reduction in corrosive gas emission during a fire that are a feature of LFH cables can considerably reduce damage to surrounding sensitive infrastructure and equipment. In

circuits that must remain functional during the initial phases of a fire, such as emergency lighting, fire pumps and air extraction systems, Fire Resistant (FR) cables are crucial for maintaining circuit integrity, even when the cable passes directly through the fire zone. These type of cables are designed to continue to operate until well after all people have been able to evacuate the facility safely. In addition to having the same properties as regular LFH cables, they incorporate elements to enable them to temporarily operate at much higher temperatures (over 1000°C) than would normally be required. Whilst being a feature of the emergency systems of many buildings, they are particularly important in underground infrastructure, such as road and rail tunnel projects.

In the event of a fire, there are two key criteria that electrical cables must meet to secure a quick and safe evacuation:

- Reaction to Fire , defined by the fire spread, the smoke opacity, the loss of flaming droplets, and the acidity of emissions. All those elements have a major impact on people’s ability to evacuate on time.

- Resistance to Fire , defined by the ability of the cable to maintain the functionality (power and communication) of the circuit under a fire, for a certain duration (from 15 to 120 minutes), and with no or minor decay of performance.

Nexans Low Fire-Hazard cables are engineered for enhanced performance under fire conditions as these flame retardant low-smoke, zero-halogen cables have a hard wearing, lead-

dramatically reduces health risks as well as environmental impact. Nexans Low Fire-Hazard cables are also nonmigratory and suitable for polystyrene applications, designed to ensure safer cabling in public places like hospitals, airports, and tunnels.

On the other hand Nexans Fire-Resistant cables are essential components of a building safety system. During the evacuation process, they ensure that critical functions (warning systems, smoke detector, smoke extractor, emergency exits, and fire lighting equipment) remain functional, even under a long exposer to flames. They significantly delay the propagation of a fire, thus gaining precious time for evacuation and firefighting, reduce to a minimum opaque smoke and acid gases, the prime cause of fire-related deaths, and damage to equipment and structures.

In addition to offering separate Fire Safety cables, Nexans incorporates Low Fire-Hazard cables into our engineered and manufactured Nexans Modular Wiring System to enhance fire safety. The system operates with several key features to improve safety:

Cable specification – cables with the correct fire safety properties (low fire hazard) are specified in advance, prepared in the factory, tested and then delivered to the site. The process is transparent

and eliminates the risk of noncompliant cable being installed in the building.

• Cable routing – with modular wiring this is pre-designed, and the wiring systemizing and lengths are determined in advance. All the modular wiring elements are clearly labelled and identified per the design.

• Service penetrations – breaches in building fabric are a major contributor to the spread of fire. In a modular wiring system, service penetrations can be appropriately designed and specified in advance – including the allowance of fire stopping and intumescent protection.

• Safe terminations – all junctions, connections and terminations in modular systems are made and tested in the factory, reducing the scope for installation errors being made on site.

At Nexans our priority is to provide our customers and partners with everything they need to design and build safe and sustainable projects. Nexans comprehensive range of cables and Modular Wiring represents the forefront of innovation, designed to help you anticipate risks, secure your assets, and protect lives.

Meet the Speaker: Alberto Ardid

Dr Alberto Ardid talks to Nicholas Dynon about his research using AI and real-time data to predict wildfire potential, his journey from geophysics to fire prediction modelling, and the power of interdisciplinary approaches to emergency response.

Alberto Ardid is a Lecturer in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Canterbury.

Dr Alberto Ardid, a Lecturer in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Canterbury (UC), is a geophysicist and environmental data scientist specialising in real-time, AIdriven forecasting models for natural hazards.

With a background in engineering science and geophysics, his research focuses on machine learning for early warning systems covering wildfires, floods, and volcanic eruptions. Alberto has led award-winning work in wildfire forecasting, including developing sub-hourly models that integrate weather and human mobility data to support timely interventions. His contributions have been recognised with the New Zealand Geophysics Prize and the Allianz Climate Risk Award.

Alberto collaborates across academia, industry, and government to develop operational forecasting tools and promote resilient infrastructure. Alberto also leads Wildfire Intelligence Ltd., a company translating this research into practical systems for fire agencies.

FNZM : I understand that you’re presenting at the conference. What will you be speaking on?

AA : The talk a will be about the future of technology in emergency response. It won’t just be about the research that I’m doing at the UC, but also a broad overview of where I believe technology for the emergency response sector is moving, and particularly for the fire sector.

I highlight how emergency technologies, like AI, remote

sensing, and real time data streams, are transforming the way that we predict, prepare for, and respond to emergencies. I’ll also provide an idea of the broad trends in terms of how this technology might help to build more resilience emergency response systems in general.

FNZM : Artificial intelligence, or AI, is a buzzword. We hear about it a lot, and it means different things in different applications. Could give us an example of how AI driven technologies might be deployed in fire?

AA : Imagine a system that updates every 15 minutes, showing the likelihood of ignition and dangerous fire behaviour in a specific district. Crews could pre-position resources, shift patrols, or issue warnings hours earlier than with traditional daily indices.

That’s what I have been working on – developing a short-term wildfire forecasting system. Based on trials conducted in Australia using historical data recreating real conditions, these machine learning forecasts have been shown to outperform standard fire and danger metrics by up to 30-50% in their ability to anticipate wildfires. We have established that these kinds of models deliver clear benefits in terms of cost savings and reducing risk.

FNZM : What type of data points would such system be utilising?

AA : These models assimilate weather data that update every 30 minutes.

Dr

They have been trained on historical data, but they are designed to update with changes that occur during the day (as opposed to daily), which is key, because fires react to weather transitions at various points during the day. These tools need to be responsive to the changes that take place during the day and not just daily or weekly.

FNZM : How would that compare with what fire services currently have in terms of their ability to forecast?

AA : The tool that the fire agencies typically use is the fire danger index. They are typically updated daily and cover big regions.

What we are developing is something that reacts faster, such as hourly, and is also more localised. This enables personnel to make decisions, such as how to deploy their resources, based on locality-specific data. Beyond emergency response, this localityspecific data can also be valuable for other sectors, for instance, the forestry or agricultural industry looking to protect their assets from potential fires.

FNZM : That sounds like a real game changer.

AA : Hopefully. We are still developing the tools, but they’re showing some promising results in Australia. We are also working here in NZ with Scion and FENZ on how to narrow this research into the future and how to identify the big challenges in adopting these technologies. One of the things that I hope to do at the Fire NZ conference is to get ideas and talk with people that have more experience than me, and to understand which direction we should be pointing this research in.

FNZM : What led you to a to what you are doing now careerwise?

AA : In high school, I was interested in science generally. I was not strong at English and always better at physics. Later I studied geophysicist in Chile. Geophysics in Chile is mostly about earthquakes, because earthquakes are the big thing over there – massive earthquakes every couple of years.

I then moved to New Zealand to work on the geothermal industry as a PhD student, developing geophysics tools relating to geothermal energy. But four years ago, I moved to Canterbury to start a project developing forecasting models for volcano eruptions using machine learning and time series analysis. We developed forecasting models for volcano

eruptions here in New Zealand, in the US, in Chile, and other places.

Around two years ago, I started developing AI driven tools for fire prediction, leveraging what I learned from volcanoes.

The two similarities that these natural hazards share are that both of them are infrequent events and are monitored through some kind of sensor that records some physical property as a time series over time. For example, with volcanoes, you typically place a seismic station near a volcano that records how the Earth’s surface vibrates close to volcano. This provides data that can help to explain what is happening inside the volcano.

In the case of fires, instead of seismic data, we have weather stations that monitor temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, and so on, and we have those records over long periods of time where we know that previous fires have occurred in the past. We train these statistical models to learn what the data typically looks like before these events, and then to look for those statistics in real time and convert that into a metric of likelihood for the near future.

FNZM : In terms of your professional journey, where did AI come into it? What led you down that track?

AA: As mentioned, I come from Geophysics. Geophysics is a lot about time series and developing mathematical models to analyse the time series of different sensors that record earth data. I was always curious about how we might identify and use the data that we can’t intuitively see in the signals.

For example, as humans when we see a signal like a cardiogram or a seismogram or any type of signal that is being recorded over time, we can typically identify some trends, such as the mean, the standard deviation, maybe some idea of the spread, and maybe some linear tendencies, but that’s about it. But when we observe these kinds of really complex measurements, it’s obvious that there are things going on in the background that we are not capturing because we aren’t able to. This is where machine learning and AI comes in – it helps us to identify patterns in all of the complexity and apparent randomness that we see in the signals.

Physics is really good at capturing trends – big picture, linear behaviours – while for non-linear behaviours, this is where AI and machine learning shine. In terms of forecasting, in the prelude to an event these dynamic, complex natural systems are just giving you big flows of complex information that looks a bit random, but with AI-based tools, you have the potential of extracting something from this apparent randomness that is useful. That’s why I got into machine learning. Around 2 years ago while working a post-doctorate in volcano eruption forecasting, I was watching a documentary with my wife about the about the Black Summer 2019-20 bushfires in Australia and she asked me, “is this something that you can apply your volcano stuff to?”. She was right, as always… At that second, I realised that the kind of tools that we were developing for volcano erosion forecasting could also be used for this.

So, I started talking with some people at the university who put me in touch with some people in Australia. I got some data tested, and it proved to work better than the fire danger index. That’s how I got to wildfires, because my wife made the link.

One thing that I’m testing now is human mobility as a predictor of fires. Most of the work that I have developed so far is about using weather data as a predictor of wildfires. But actually, the human part is quite significant, because the ignition is typically caused, at least here in New Zealand, by people. We are now looking to collect traffic data and using human mobility as a proxy for how many people may be out there hiking or doing other stuff in the wilderness and see if that can help to inform the forecasting models.

For example, let’s imagine that we have a bunch of weather stations around a national park that typically provide weather-related statistics that we can use for fire prediction purposes. What if we could also track, for example, how many people are accessing the park during the day? If we place a traffic sensor near the park that collects data that can be used as a proxy for how many people may be in the park, that may provide an additional layer of context.

All hazards share a key challenge: making sense of complex, fastchanging data to support rapid decisions. Volcanoes taught me about precursors and early warning, floods about physical constraints like mass conservation, and wildfires about weather and human behaviour as a driver. Bringing these insights together has allowed me to design generalised forecasting frameworks that can transfer across hazards, and that’s exactly the kind of flexibility emergency services need.

FNZM : What are the key challenges with adopting these technologies?

AA : With this kind of technology, you need to build trust first, and for that the tools need to be transparent. They need to be explainable, so responders know why a forecast says what it does. You need to be able to understand how the model is making its decisions, so you can make your decisions.

There are also big challenges faced in getting access to data. Many regions don’t have dense networks of weather or hazard sensors, which limits performance. Additionally, a lot of entities own data for their own use. But ultimately, if we were able to combine the data it will just improve things for everyone.

Another big challenge is that of integrating these tools with operations. These new tools need to be able to fit into existing workflows and not create additional complexity. They need to be able to simplify things. And that’s a big challenge. These technologies are, in essence, pretty complex, but the outputs need to be interpretable and simple enough so as to avoid creating an extra layer of complexity for the people I’m hoping from the conference is to explore the challenges that I have observed in terms of the adoption of these kinds of technologies. So far I have seen excellent attitudes from the fire community in terms of adopting new tools. And with the right partnerships and collaboration, I believe we can overcome these barriers and make these tools truly operational.

Meet the Speaker: Peter Wilkinson

Former IFE International President Dr Peter Wilkinson talks to Nicholas Dynon about CROSS reporting, the challenge of evidencing competence in fire engineering, and making the most of poor career advice.

Dr Peter Wilkinson is a Chartered Engineer, Chartered Scientist and Registered Fire Risk Assessor, and director of safety, fire and risk engineering practice Pyrology Limited.

Dr Peter Wilkinson is a Chartered Engineer, a Chartered Scientist, and a Registered Fire Risk Assessor based in the United Kingdom. He is the director of independent safety, fire and risk engineering practice Pyrology Limited, which he founded in 2012.

Before his current role, Peter was an Associate Director at the Fire Protection Association, overseeing the activities of the Fire and Risk Services group, and before that, an Associate Director with a multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy, leading a team of fire engineering consultants and fire risk assessors.

Peter is a Trustee Director and a Past International President of the Institution of Fire Engineers (IFE). He is also a Visiting Professor at the School of Architecture, Building and Civil Engineering at Loughborough University, where he helps inject fire safety know how into architecture and built-environment student curricula.

Additionally, Peter is a Designated Person at CROSS (Collaborative Reporting for Safer Structures), managing the confidential safety reports that CROSS-UK receives. He also chairs the British Standards Technical Committee FSH/24, which develops and codifies fire safety engineering practices, and represents the UK on European standards committees.

FNZM : Peter, tell us a bit about the presentation you’ll be delivering at FireNZ.

PW: It’s actually a great opportunity, because when I was international president of the Institution of Fire

Engineers a couple of years ago, I was set to come out to Auckland for the conference in 2023. I had checked in to my flight online, and then I woke up to drive to the airport but couldn’t get out of bed because I had Covid! So it’s fantastic to have the opportunity to try this again!

I’ll be presenting one paper and participating in a couch session, which is fantastic. The first one is about collaborative reporting in which I’ll be talking about a development that has occurred since the Grenfell Tower fire to extend and enhance confidential concerns reporting. The CROSS scheme was set up originally to deal with structural safety concerns and for people within the construction sector to be able to confidentially report concerns so that others could benefit and learn from them.

It was one of the recommendations in Dame Judith Hackett’s review of fire safety in the Building Regulations after the Grenfell Tower fire that the scheme be extended to include fire safety. I’ve been involved in the scheme since 2021, using my contacts within the Institution of Fire Engineers to create an expert panel.

My talk will explain all this, but importantly, it will also discuss some of the issues that have been reported to us, both in terms of volume, the quantities of issues, and then focusing in on some trends that are being identified. What is it, for example, that people are reporting to us repeatedly that provide us with an insight as to whether changes may need to be made to the technical guidance that supports building regulations, and things like that.

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It’s a presentation that’s developed over time and that I’m constantly updating based on the latest information we’re receiving.

There is a CROSS committee and an expert panel in Australia and New Zealand set up by the Institution of Structural Engineers, but for the time being they only focus on structural safety, and what we want to do is expand that to cover fire safety as well. I’m hoping to get some support from people in the audience and the institutions in Australia and New Zealand to help facilitate that.

FNZM : What would trigger a report under a reporting regime?

PW: I’ll explain this in much greater detail in my presentation, but what we’re interested in receiving are lower level concerns, such as near misses and minor incidents. There are other routes to reporting incidents that result in fatalities – that’s the top of the risk pyramid, and they need to be reported in a different way. What we’re hoping to do is identify the

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lower level issues and items to help prevent those from escalating into big issues.

If you think about, what happened at Grenfell is a catalogue of errors. Lots of things happened, which brings [James Reason’s] Swiss cheese model to mind. When the Swiss cheese holes line up, you get something catastrophic happening. We want to eliminate these little holes so that we don’t get the catastrophes.

FNZM : What will you be discussing in your couch session?

PW: My couch session discussion will draw from of my presidential presentation that I was going to give in 2023, which focuses on competence. Post Grenfell, there’s been a lot of talk about competence within the fire sector, and there’s been a lot of soul searching and a lot of criticism of the various actors within the construction sector.

Competence is really key – how you can demonstrate it, how you can prove your competence, and how the general

public have confidence that we in the fire sector are going to do what we say we’re going to do, and do it right. And that’s something where the Institution of Fire Engineers has a key role to play as the professional organisation for fire engineers.

The Grenfell Tower public inquiry has thrown up some fundamental questions that we’ve got to respond to, such as what is a fire engineer?

FNZM : It sounds existential.

PW: It is existential. I think fire engineering is a spectrum, and it’s about time that we identify there are different roles within it, and those roles have different expectations. They have different competence requirements and different ways of demonstrating that, and it’s too confusing for the general public or clients and people in the wider construction sector. So, we really need to pin this down.

My talk is about competence and cooperation. It looks at where the founders of the profession came from, and how the profession developed, and

then it looks forward to the challenges we’ve got today that we’ve got to address to restore confidence in the profession.

FNZM : I imagine this might elicit some confronting conversations. Is this an issue that you’ve presented on previously or engaged in public debate over?

PW: Yes, and it’s a real issue that we’re dealing with now. The government in the UK has set a sort of panel of “experts” to determine what the role of fire engineering is. The panel includes academia and government officials, but there are very few people on the panel that are actually what I would consider to be practicing fire engineers.

And that’s okay, because they’re a panel of people who are inviting other bodies to come and talk to them, present to them. Yet, at the same time, the panel is developing their ideas about how the fire engineering profession can be regulated in the future, so it has the potential of fundamentally impacting on the Institution of Fire Engineers and the relationship we have with the Engineering Council for registration of engineers. It’s a real current conundrum that we’re all trying to help move forward.

Robust discussion is great because everybody’s got a slightly different perspective. It’s amazing that since the Grenfell Tower tragedy, my experience in the UK has been that everybody has an opinion about fire safety and fire engineering. And the real difficulty is there’s not been the capacity of competent fire engineers to respond to the demand.

Everybody now understands that they need competent advice at the right time, but we just haven’t got the capacity to respond to that, including discussions about things such as what is a fire strategy?

Fire strategy is a simple term but it means different things to different people. To an architect it means putting red lines on a drawing, to a building surveyor it means a couple of paragraphs within their contract, to a fire engineer it’s a big document that

explains how the building works and responds to fire for life safety reasons. So even the language that we’re using within the profession needs consistency and a common understanding of what these things are.

FNZM : What was your path towards what you’re doing now? Where did it all begin? What was the spark?

PW: I aspired to be an architect. I was interested in buildings and how they looked, and I wanted to be able to design them.

I received some very poor career advice when I was at school. I remember going to the careers advisor saying, “I want to be an architect; what subjects do I need to study?” But they said that architecture is just about artistic expression in buildings, and they didn’t think I was arty enough. They suggested, “why don’t you do civil engineering instead?”

My first degree was in civil engineering, and I didn’t really enjoy that. It wasn’t what I wanted to do at all, and I still had this ambition that I wanted to be involved in the design of buildings and work closely with architects, and so I specialised in my final year project on the design of buildings for fire safety. That was the start of my research and interest in how fire safety can help influence the design and layout of buildings.

Then, in my early career, I studied part time for a master’s degree in fire and explosion engineering. My career then went into consulting, and then I was fortunate enough to have the Fire Protection Association in the UK as my employer who sponsored me to do an engineering doctorate. I was able to go back to my original university and study on my terms about resilient building design for resilient fire engineering.

So, it sort of went full circle, and I was back at that original University studying building design, but this time in relation to resilient fire engineering.

Since then, I’ve become a visiting professor at that university, and I teach architecture students fire safety design. So it does feel quite satisfying to have had that ambition quashed by some give in Auckland.

Meet the Speaker: Maria Kornakova

Architect engineer and urban planner, Dr Maria Kornakova talks to Nicholas Dynon about participative approaches to managing the risks associated with bushfires in communities at the urban-natural interface.

Dr Maria Kornakova, an architect engineer and urban planner, is National Bushfire Manager at the Fire Protection Association Australia.

Dr Maria Kornakova is National Bushfire Manager at the Fire Protection Association Australia. An architect engineer and urban planner, Maria has focused her career on bushfire risk reduction across the built and natural environments.

At FPA Australia, Maria leads national efforts to strengthen the Bushfire Planning and Design (BPAD) accreditation scheme and drive professional capability in bushfire assessment, building and planning. Her work supports greater integration between planning, design, and engineering practices, particularly at the interface between natural and build environment.

In her role, Maria collaborates with government, industry, and practitioners to shape standards, training, and policy that enable more resilient outcomes in bushfire-prone environments. She is a strong advocate for connecting science, regulation, and practice in the development of practical, risk-informed solutions.

Maria also represents Australia’s bushfire resilience expertise on the international stage, having presented at global conferences and most recently being featured on the NFPA podcast. She holds a Master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning which she completed as a Fulbright Scholar in Michigan State University, and a PhD from the University of Melbourne, and has conducted postdoctoral research in Australia and New Zealand.

FNZM : Maria, tell us about the presentation you’ll be delivering at Fire NZ.

MK : I’ll be talking about designing resilient communities at the urbannatural interface, so looking at the areas where the bush meets urban development, and looking at the various strategies to building, planning, fuel breaks, providing evacuation routes for communities, making sure that emergency crews are safe, and looking at the wildfire interface that can be used to protect lives, properties and firefighters.

FNZM : How did your career in fire begin?

MK : When I finished high school in Uzbekistan, I went to the university to study architecture. Back home the degrees are slightly different, so I graduated as an ‘architect engineer’ looking more at the construction side of things rather than designing pretty buildings.

Towards the end of my degree, and considering various aspects of architecture, I became interested in town planning and urban design, looking at the larger scale as opposed to individual buildings. I developed a specific interest in the way that communities are able to respond to various events that occur, such as fire emergencies.

Parallel to that, I wanted to get some training overseas, so I successfully applied for a Fulbright scholarship. I went to the US, and for two years I studied urban and regional planning at Michigan State University.

At some point during my master’s research, which was looking at design and grassroots democracy, I considered going on to do a PhD. My supervisor

suggested that if I was interested in the way that communities are involved in planning, I should have a look at Australia. So, I applied to the University of Melbourne, got accepted, and came over here in 2012.

My PhD journey, similar to many people, went through various iterations along the way. I ultimately researched disasters and looked into urban planning and disaster risk management, including a New Zealand case study.

I then got a postdoctoral position at Massey University, and moved to Palmerston North, but halfway through I was offered a position with FPA Australia as a bushfire coordinator and I returned to Australia. When you see the job that grabs you, you just go for it!

So, I moved back here in December 2018 and since then I’ve been progressively promoted to manager and then National Manager. The bulk of my work involves working with BPAD (Bushfire Planning and Design) accredited practitioners, who are in the bushfire space and looking at building and planning practices for the naturalurban interface.

I was also a volunteer for the CFA for a relatively short period of time. Unfortunately, my work takes me to a lot of places. It’s a national role that involves travel, so it’s not really workable for me to be on call to assist. Reluctantly, I was unable to continue. But I do cold burns. I’ve got an access to large of land in the high country of Victoria, and I do cold burns there, which provides me with opportunities to deepen my understanding of how the bushfire works.

FNZM : Why was Australia suggested to you as a potential destination for your PhD?

MK : My PhD topic was in community involvement, and the role that the community plays in making decisions. My supervisor suggested Australia, because it’s a mandatory voting country. Community involvement is therefore relatively embedded, and communities tend to have a bit more say in practices. People tend to be a little bit more vocal here.

I also was interested to work with Professor Alan March as my supervisor at the University of Melbourne.

FNZM : Looking at the international context, where does Australia sit in terms of regional and urban planning in relation to bushfires. How are we doing?

MK : We’re the best. I just got back from the National Fire Protection Association Conference in the US Vegas in June and would have to say that Australia is leading the world. One of the first events that changed the way that we look at designing communities and planning and building controls in relation to bushfires was the Ash Wednesday fires of 1983. Since then, there have been incremental changes and stronger and stronger enforcement.

In the state of Victoria, for example, if you are in a bushfire prone area, which is pretty much 95% of the state, you have to build at a minimum requirement for bushfire attack. So, there is an expectation of bushfire happening at some point. That’s streamlined

throughout the building space. And then, if you are in a slightly higher risk area, which is also mapped out, you have to provide a planning control.

So, there are additional controls to make sure that lives are not going to be lost, and that property is going to be as safe as possible. And if the fire fighters do need to come and either protect the asset or tap into a property’s water, then those practices are unform.

Australia is definitely in a leading position, and then Europe’s probably a close second, including Turkey, Portugal, and Spain.

FNZM : Now jumping ahead to the presentation that you’re looking to deliver over here when you come out for the conference. Any, I guess, any, any teasers, any more of an introduction to your to your proposed topic?

MK : I’ll talk about the increasing risks of wildfires and explore a couple case studies that demonstrate how in Australia we incorporate some of the urban design techniques to provide safety for firefighters crews. I’ll talk about the fuel breaks, and how they can be implemented to make sure that the truck can come into the turn points and so on.

I’ll also talk a little bit about the building codes and planning, but I don’t plan to bore people with the legislative background!

FNZM : Will you be discussing this at the level of street layouts or rather individual properties?

MK : I think something will be both. In terms of an individual property, if you’ve got a large property you need to position your house in a way that is accessible to firefighters if they come to protect it or need to tap into your resources.

In terms of the wider scale, if you’ve got a new subdivision coming in, what can you do around it? I’ll just show a couple examples of what we do in Australia, which can be made complicated by the fact that each state does things a little differently and uses different approaches, appliances and terminologies.

Meet the Speaker: Jonathan Barnett

Dr Jonathan Barnett talks to Nicholas Dynon about his career journey in fire, testifying before Congress on 9/11, accumulating air miles, and fire as a weapon threat.

Dr Jonathan Barnett is an internationally acclaimed technical expert in fire safety engineering and a director of specialist forensic engineering and fire engineering firm The Basic Group Pty Ltd.

Dr Jonathan Barnett is an internationally acclaimed technical expert in fire safety engineering with over forty-five years’ experience in his field. Jonathan is a chartered professional engineer and a leader in building defect rectification strategies.

Previously a professor at WPI in the United States, Jonathan has researched topics such as computer modelling of fire, structural fire protection, combustible cladding, and the development of new fire test standards. Jonathan has completed projects throughout the world including in the US, Europe, New Zealand and Australia. In Australia, he has worked with the CSIRO, the University of Melbourne, Victoria University, the University of Newcastle, the Australasian Fire Authorities Council, and fire brigades in Victoria and New South Wales.

He is a director of The Basic Group Pty Ltd, a specialist forensic engineering and fire engineering firm with offices in Australia and the UK. The firm focuses on helping people with non-compliant buildings deal with dangerous cladding, inappropriate Essential Safety Measures (fire alarm and detection systems, fire rated door, etc), and helping them with building rectifications from design, to permits, to construction, to special risks such as EVs, and through litigation.

FNZM : Jonathan, tell us about the presentation you’ll be delivering at Fire NZ.

JB: I’ll be giving a talk, and also presenting as part of a panel. The panel discussion will be really interesting

because it will include Greg Drummond from Fire & Rescue New South Wales, Kim Lovegrove, who is a lawyer and a kiwi who has spent a lot of his life in Australia, Africa and NZ and has worked internationally, and the veteran Australian fire engineer David Isaac.

Coincidentally, I was talking to my team this morning, and they were just out looking at a building where we required that new smoke alarms be installed with a decibel level of 85 to 90. When we went out and measured it, the reading came back as 104, which can actually hurt someone. It had all been spelled out for them yet they still couldn’t manage to get that part right.

Then for that same project, we recommended that intumescent fire boxes be installed, and the owner complained that it would be difficult. They had a switch that had been tested, so we asked them to send us the test result. Two weeks later, they finally sent us the results and it turns out that the testing had nothing to do with fire. Ultimately, they had the fire rated boxes that we had recommended installed, and, sure enough, they’re now commenting about how easy it was!

FNZM : What do you attribute those types of behaviours to?

JB : I think that much of the industry is not regulated the way it should be. And by that, I think we have sloppy inspections. We have an attitude of “she’ll be right mate.” There’s a preconceived idea that if it’s done right it’s more expensive. In the case I just mentioned, it was actually cheaper to do it right. The lack of education is very frustrating.

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FNZM : Let’s go back to Jonathan Barnett as a high school graduate considering his career options. Where did your journey to fire engineering begin?

JB : I have my bachelor’s and master’s degree in civil engineering, and I did my master’s degree looking at seismic design of concrete structures.

As part of that, I went to Managua, Nicaragua, in January 1975 to talk to people and understand the effect of a large earthquake they had experienced in 1973. When I met with people, they didn’t talk about the earthquake and the buildings collapsing, they talked about the fires.

So that triggered my interest in fire and structures. One thing led to another, and I took some elective subjects in fire engineering as a postgraduate student. When I graduated with my master’s degree, I joined a company called Gestetnar as a safety and fire engineer.

Gestetnar made office equipment, and I was responsible for safety, fire engineering and property for their

70 or so buildings in the US. The company also had offices in Australia and New Zealand, and so I did the review of a design for a warehouse in Sydney. They tried to promote me into a management training program, so I quit.

I was then about to join the Peace Corps and go off to Haiti when a fire engineer who had heard about me, Rex Wilson at Firepro, said, “Jonathan, come work for me”. So I did.

That only lasted a year and a half, but it was very important. The last building I designed while working for him was the headquarters for the US National Fire Protection Association, which was kind of exciting.

After that, I joined Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), in Worcester Massachusetts, as a young instructor in their fire engineering program. I also worked on my PhD which was on the impact of fire on steel structures.

It was a new academic program, and we didn’t have a lab in those early days, but we did have computers. I got into the computer modelling of fire just

because there was nothing else I could do!

During this time, the famous fire engineer from Australia, Peter Johnson, came to WPI to study a master’s degree with us. He and I met, and he took my introduction to computers and fire course. After he returned to Australia, he arranged for the government to bring me over to teach computer modelling of fire. At that stage no one in the country had that knowledge.

This was in 1992 with the CSIRO in North Ryde in Sydney, and with what was then Footscray Technical College, but now Victoria University in Melbourne.

While there I met some kiwis who were starting up a new fire program in Christchurch, and that’s what brought me to New Zealand in 1993. I taught the first course in fire dynamics at the University of Canterbury.

Since then, New Zealand has had a top notch fire engineering program at the University of Canterbury, and until recently, there was nothing in Australia anywhere near the quality and level of Canterbury’s program. The program

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at University of Queensland is quite good. The other two programs are at Victoria University and the University of Western Sydney.

In 1996, I started bringing students from WPI to Australia doing social science projects related to societal need and technology. The idea behind this was that if you just crunch numbers, then you don’t understand your clients – you need to understand why they’re doing things, and you need to be able to relate to them, talk to them, and work in teams. I came to Australia 38 times between then and 2007 bringing out third year students from WPI.

When 9/11 occurred, I was asked by the American Society of Civil Engineers to join the building performance study they were conducting with FEMA and I was a leader in the fire group in the investigation of 9/11 and testified before Congress on our findings.

FNZM : That must have been a challenging period.

JB : It was. When I was on scene they were still pulling human remains out of the debris. It was quite difficult, physically and mentally.

We had to submit our report in March, and I testified on the first of May. In between, I went to Kakadu to go barramundi fishing, and I gave my first talk on 9/11 to the emergency services in Jabiru! I went on to do 110 talks on 9/11.

In 2007 I left the university. It was for a lot of reasons, including differences of opinion about the purpose of a university. I was also the only openly gay engineering professor, and the administration was not pleased with that. We had a parting of the ways after I had been there for 28 years on staff and six years as a student.

In my early days, being gay was not something you could talk about, particularly not in the world of engineers, not in the world of firefighters. Today, it’s not an issue at all. Times change, and I think that change occurred over that time period.

After I left WPI, I was in Melbourne in 2008 and was offered a job, and ended up moving here in

2010. I run my own company now with a business partner. Our company, Basic Expert, does fire engineering and forensic work, and we have offices in Melbourne and in London.

FNZM : What was the catalyst for an office in London?

JB : I was working on the Grenfell Tower post-fire investigation, and a man named Brian Ashe, who wrote the Australian Building Code, had moved back to the UK. He and Basic Expert formed a partnership.

FNZM : For the conference, what will you be speaking on in terms of your individual topic?

JB : It’s a short talk. I think it’s a half hour, and I’m going to be talking about fire as a weapon threat – it’s normally just abbreviated as ‘fire as a weapon’, but that’s pronounced ‘FAW’. FAW is hard to say when you’re giving a talk, whereas FAWT is much easier.

The talk is really about should we be worrying about arson. Worldwide, building regulations ignore arson. But if you’re designing, a mosque, a synagogue, a church, or a community centre, should you be designing in a way to minimise the impact of the fire? These aren’t hard targets, like police stations or embassies. Are there simple things that you can do that can make a difference?

I was going to deliver this talk in Israel this month, but for various reasons we decided not to. What’s interesting though is that when Iran fired missiles at Israel in the recent

attack, one of the ballistic missiles hit a high rise building and the sprinkler system put the fire out. It was designed normally, not for a ballistic missile, but it was effective.

We’ve had two synagogues attacked in Melbourne in the past year or so. One burned to the ground. It had been fire bombed in 1996, and had been rebuilt but not with arson in mind, so in this latest incident it burnt to the ground again. People were inside and praying and they were lucky they escaped.

Installing sprinklers cost about the same as wall-to-wall carpeting – or maybe even less – or, if instead of sprinklers, they had put in some fire barriers that would have made a difference.

In the other synagogue firebombing, it was a Friday night and there were again people praying. A guy threw petrol at the building, and even though the fire got into the building, it actually didn’t go anywhere because of how the building was designed. It wasn’t designed for this threat; it was just coincidence that the design neutralised it.

The point is that design features designed to treat the threat of arson don’t need to be expensive, and they can serve other purposes.

As fire engineers and designers, we typically ignore arson. We say it’s too difficult. But let’s say that for minimal money, we can enable the building deal with around 80% of potential arson attacks. Why wouldn’t we do that in the case of a building that we knew had a potential of being the subject of a FAWT?

Strengthening fire safety in buildings

The Government will amend the Building Code to better protect New Zealanders, following strong calls for change as part of the nationwide Building Code fire safety review 2024.

On 08 August, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) released the summary of submissions from last year’s consultation on fire safety regulations in the Building Code.

The review was launched following the devastating fire at Loafers Lodge in Wellington, which claimed the lives of five people in May 2023.

“The recent tragedy here and similar incidents overseas have made it clear we need to look closely at how safe our buildings are, especially larger residential accommodation,” stated Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk.

“More than 100 organisations, businesses, and individuals across New Zealand shared their insights during the consultation,” he said. “I want to thank everyone who took the time to make a submission.”

Since the last update of the Building Code fire safety regulations in 2012, building uses, technology, materials and construction methods have evolved rapidly – adding new complexities to fire safety in our buildings and to firefighting.

The minister commented that many of those who lodged consultation

Chris Penk, Building and Construction Minister

submissions agreed that the current framework is overly complex, with confusing building classifications and unclear language.

“These issues are causing inconsistent compliance decisions, consenting delays and challenges for owners trying to maintain buildings,” he said.

“Respondents agreed that it is essential for all building occupants to be able to evacuate safely, including people with disabilities and those in accommodation like hotels, motels and boarding houses. Others agreed the

rules should target specific fire hazards to ensure requirements are fit-forpurpose and cost-effective.”

There was also, he said, support for ensuring fire safety provisions in the Building Code align with the realities of modern-day firefighting to protect firefighters while doing their jobs.

We have a clear mandate to strengthen protections for New Zealanders by updating our fire safety requirements for buildings.

“I have instructed the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment to incorporate this feedback into proposed Building Code changes for Cabinet to consider early next year.”

The government has confirmed that changes to fire safety provisions will be progressed separately from the new three-year Building Code update cycle, reflecting the relative priority and ongoing nature of this work.

Further information on the Building Code fire safety review 2024 is available on the MBIE website. The summary of submissions can also be found on the MBIE website.

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FIRENZ INDUSTRY AWARDS AND

GALA DINNER

8TH OCTOBER 2025

SHED 10, QUEENS WHARF, AUCKLAND

“The fire industry awards represent the best of the fire industry and recognise those that contribute to achieving a safer New Zealand”

The FireNZ committee wish to present the annual awards that become recognised as being representative of the entire New Zealand fire industry and create a legacy that becomes an aspiration for achievement.

THIS YEAR’S AWARD CATEGORIES:

• Mt Hutt E-Learning Project Excellence in Fire Protection &/or Engineering Award (Under $5M)

• Onestaff Project Excellence in Fire Protection &/or Engineering Award (Over $5M)

• Korok Unsung Hero Award

Contego Emerging Fire Professional/Technician Award

Ryanfire Emerging Fire Engineer Award

Comfortech Sustainability Award

• Carboline | Altex Coatings Innovative Product Award

• Competenz Fire Learner of the Year Award

For more information please visit www.firenz.org or our LinkedIn page for the latest release information https://www.linkedin.com/company/firenz/

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FPANZ

The Fire Protection Association NZ is the primary organisation which represents the fire protection industry in New Zealand.

The Association liaises closely with relevant government departments and ministries and, has strong links with other building related associations. The Association has been operating now for 50 years, and has grown significantly by representing more and more companies and organisations that work in the fire protection industry.

Our membership base includes businesses that are involved in fire alarm manufacturing, fire alarm services, fire protection sprinkler industry, evacuation consultants, fire equipment distributors, insurance companies, fire engineers, Fire and Emergency New Zealand and Territorial Authorities.

IFE

The Institution of Fire Engineers New Zealand Branch is part of an international learned body which was founded in 1918 and incorporated in New Zealand in 1924 with the following main objectives:

 To promote, encourage and improve the science and practice of fire engineering, fire prevention and fire extinction, and all operations and expedients connected therewith.

 To give an impulse to ideas likely to be useful in connection with, or in relation to such science and practice to the members of the Institution and community at large.

Membership of the IFE is drawn from a large cross section of the community, all with a common interest in fire engineering. Examples of organisations that members belong are Fire and Emergency NZ, Airport Rescue Fire Service, Rural Fire Service, the Insurance Industry, the Building Industry, the Fire Protection Industry, Fire Engineering Consultants and organisations tasked with emergency incident management.

SFPE

The New Zealand Chapter of the Society of Fire Protection Engineers is the primary organisation representing the fire engineering professionals of New Zealand.

SFPE NZ is a technical group of Engineering NZ for matters of Fire Engineering.

The purpose of the SFPE is to advance the science and practice of fire protection engineering and its allied fields, to maintain a high ethical standard among its members, to develop fire protection engineering guidelines and standards and to foster fire protection engineering education.

In accomplishing this purpose, SFPE NZ has engaged in activities that are educational, scientific, charitable or promote the practice of fire protection engineering since 1994.

SFPE NZ members include representatives of all sectors of the fire protection industry with an interest in the development, application and promotion of scientific and engineering methods to reduce the risks of unwanted fires.

The Exibition the exhibition 2025

FIRENZ 2025 EXHIBITORS

Bondor Platinum Sponsor

Firestop Centre Platinum Sponsor

Viking Sales & Service Platinum Sponsor

Winstone Wallboards GIB Platinum Sponsor

Argus Fire Protection Coffee Cart Sponsor

BRANZ Lanyard Sponsor

Boss Passive Fire Gold Sponsor

Abodo Wood Silver Sponsor

Dulux Protective Coatings Silver Sponsor

Promax Silver Sponsor

Ryanfire Silver Sponsor

Wastech Engineering Silver Sponsor

Zone Architectural Products Silver Sponsor

Alan Wilson Insurance Brokers Bronze Sponsor

Akzonobel Coatings Ltd

Alarm New Zealand

Allproof Industries New Zealand

Altex Coatings Ltd

Ampac New Zealand

Beele Australasia Ltd

Bensan Distribution

Clarinspect

Comfortech Building Performance

Solutions

Deeco Services Ltd

Fire and Rescue Products NZ

Fire Protection Technologies

Hilti New Zealand

Hydroflow, Fire, HVAC & Fabrication

Johnson Controls

Kingspan New Zealand Ltd

Konnect Fastening Systems

Milwaukee Tools

nVent

Orbital Fire

Pertronic Industries

PPG Industries NZ Ltd

PSL Fire & Safety

Pumpset Technology

Reliable Fire Sprinkler (Australia)

Pty Ltd

Reliant Solutions Ltd

Rotho Blaas NZ Ltd

Safeworld

Smoke Control

Steel & Tube Holdings Ltd

Tekin Industries

The Building Agency

Victaulic

Wagner Fire Safety

Wisu Alarm

Won-Door New Zealand

The Programme

2025 Conference Programme

Upon registration you will receive an invitation to download our conference app where details of the presentations will be shared. Any amendments to this program will be available on the conference app.

PROGRAMME: DAY ONE

6.00am EHS/Exhibitor Pack In

Tuesday

7th October

8.30am Chris Field

9.00am International Convention Centre

9.30am SFPE Session – TBC TBA 9.45am

10.00am

10.30am

11.00am

11.15am

12.00pm –1.20pm

Registration & Trade Show opens / Lunch

1.20pm Opening by Event MC

1.30pm SPEAKER: Debbie Scott

1.55pm KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Mike Brunzell

2.35pm SPEAKER: Tim Farrant

3.00pm –3.45pm Afternoon Tea

3.45pm SPEAKER: Spencer Johnstone

4.05pm SPEAKER: Aaron Nicholson

4.30pm SPEAKER: Nick Linton

4.55pm SPEAKER: Dr Anthony Parkes

5.20pm SPEAKER: Dr Claire Benson

5.45pm Conference Close / Recap

5.45pm –6.45pm Drinks and Canapes

7.00pm –10.30pm FireNZ Presidents Club by invitation only

SFPE Session – TBC TBA

SFPE Session – TBC International Convention Centre

SFPE Session – TBC

SPEAKER Justin McEntyre

FCIA MOU and DIIM series - Q&A International Convention Centre - Fire Protection Focus

SPEAKER Cam Grant-Fargie Milwaukee tools

SPEAKER Jason Godsmark Clarinspect

SPEAKERS Gilbert Gordon & Rayane Hintay Bensan & GL McGavin

SPEAKER Pierre Gandino

Please note that the speakers and topics are correct at the time of publication but are subject to change if required

Please note that the speakers and topics are correct at the time of publication but are subject to change if required

Conference Programme

PROGRAMME: DAY TWO Wednesday 8th October

Time

1 KAWAU ROOM

7.00am –8.00am Registration & Trade Show opens

2

1

3

Showcase RANGITOTO 3

8.15am Abodo Wood

8.25am Opening by Event MC

8.30am Opening address by FPA, IFE, SFPE Presidents

8.40am KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Dave Barber Altex

9.25am

SPEAKER: Darren Aitken

9.50am KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Dr Greg Drummond

10.35am –11.20am Morning Tea

SPEAKER Devin Glennie Ryanfire Products

11.20am KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Richard Mills International Paint

12.05pm KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Adj Prof Kim Lovegrove Wagner

12.45pm – 1.30pm Lunch

1.30pm KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Dr Peter Wilkinson Steel & Tube

KEYNOTE COUCH SESSION

2.15pm

Adj Prof Kim Lovegrove, Dr Jonathan Barnett, David Isaac, Dr Greg Drummond

Global Fire Safety – Bridging Engineering, Regulation and Response

3.15pm –4.00pm Afternoon Tea

4.00pm

SPEAKER: Prof John Tookey

4.25pm KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Dr Maria Kornakova

5.00pm SPEAKER: Manar Ibrahim

5.25pm Conference Close / Recap

5.40pm Drinks and Canapes

7.00pm GALA DINNER

Close of Day Two

SPEAKER Ram Rajendran Fire Protection Technologies

SPEAKERS

Prativadi Krishna & Donel Dippi

SPEAKER Gordon Chen

Please note that the speakers and topics are correct at the time of publication but are subject to change if required

Please note that the speakers and topics are correct at the time of publication but are subject to change if required

The Programme

PROGRAMME: DAY THREE Thursday 9th October

7.30am –8.30am Registration & Trade Show opens

8.55am Opening by Event MC

9.00am SPEAKER: Paul Clements

9.25am KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Dr Alberto Ardid

PANEL: Chris Mak, Site Safe, Peter Wilkinson, Jeff Fahrensohn, Phil Larcombe Fire Protection during Construction Tekin

10.05am KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Jason D'Silva Wastech

10.35am –11.10am Morning Tea

11.10am –12.20pm

KEYNOTE COUCH SESSION Richard Mills, Peter Wilkinson, Mike Brunzell, Maria Kornakova

Formal Conference Closing Address

12.20pm –1.20pm Lunch

1.20pm Trade Show closes

1.20pm KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Dr Jonathan Barnett SPEAKER Dr Christian van der Pump IFE NZ AGM

2.00pm KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Simon Rickard

2.35pm SPEAKER: Bex Baddeley

3.00pm Conference Closes

Please note that the speakers and topics are correct at the time of publication but are subject to change if required

Please note that the speakers and topics are correct at the time of publication but are subject to change if required