European countries already have very high fire safety standards for surface transport – such as trains or ships – to protect people.

However, existing rules are limited. Current safety tests predict only some of the health risks in transport fires and cannot be adapted easily for new transport technology, says Eric Guillaume, head of research and development at France’s Laboratoire national de métrologie et d’essais, the coordinator of the EU-funded project TRANSFEU.

An important gap is in assessing toxic gas risk. Standard tests only require safety assessors to collect information on toxic gases produced by a component at certain stages in a fire, making it difficult to predict the overall risk. Tests also only apply to individual materials and components, instead of looking at how components burning in a whole carriage might affect each other.

TRANSFEU aimed to address these issues by developing more complete fire toxicity tests for train components. The project team applied a more holistic approach to fire safety testing and engineering in general, giving train manufacturers and safety authorities a better overview of the combined health risk of a fire.

The new approach could give manufacturers more leeway to use lighter materials and carriage designs that fit in more passengers, as long as they could show that these were safe in combination with other materials and parts of the design in a transport system, says Guillaume.

More accurate tests for toxic gases would also make Europe-wide surface transport fire safety standards possible, saving money and time for rail operators and manufacturers, who currently have to work with different national standards, he adds.

Reaction to the new test method has been very positive, with interest from regulators and standards bodies around the world, says Guillaume.

A bigger picture

TRANSFEU developed a method to measure gas and smoke emissions from train components for the whole time they can burn. Using the test results, the team created standard toxicity categories that help safety authorities easily evaluate a component’s health risk, along with a database on fire safety information for 67 components. 

TRANSFEU then developed a new system for assessing the overall risk from different types of railway fire, using standard fire safety engineering methodology.

Fire safety engineering investigates all aspects of a structure and its environment in a fire, including interactions between components, how the fire spreads and the use of safety measures such as emergency exits. It also looks at the effects of design features such as fire resistant doors, ventilation and places to exit the structure.

“Modelling fire is difficult because of the multiple parameters,” Guillaume explains. “It is only possible now because of increased computer processing power and better modelling tools.”

Existing virtual fire simulation tools provide a basis for testing scenarios of typical railway fires. By varying parameters, the team studied how changes to components and layout affect the spread of fires in train compartments and how quickly and easily passengers can evacuate to safety.

Although this testing was developed for trains, it can be used for other transport methods, such as ships, ferries, buses and coaches, and even surrounding spaces such as stations.

The team have sent their results to the European Committee for Standardization and the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). Guillaume expects the proposed test method standards to be accepted by ISO within two years and for EU-wide standards to be adopted in the near future.

Guillaume sees an opportunity for Europe to promote its own standards as part of a worldwide trend towards greater harmonisation of such rules. Because the project partners include research institutions, manufacturers, operators and regulation and standardisation bodies, he says, this has encouraged acceptance of its results internationally and across transport industries.

Guillaume predicts: “TRANSFEU’s partners have developed a network of expertise that may be very useful for the future of railway fire safety.” Data from the project are publicly available for further research, while the former project partners are helping to revise existing rules on surface transport fire safety.