NFPA 921 Update Page

NFPA 921 Committee Meeting Photos March 2005

NFPA Technical Committee on Fire Investigations is responsible for the maintenance and development of the Guide for Fire and Explosion Investigations and is busy on the next edition.  The document preparation, if it remains on schedule, will result in a new edition in 2008.  Several significant changes will be apparent in this new edition. 

 Click Here: Fall 2008 Edition Cycle

Chapter 5: Basic Fire Science

Chapter 5 will be studied to insure that any new research that has occurred in the last three years is included in the chapter.  If you wish to contribute to that discussion, contact:

Task Group Chair: Craig Beyler (CBeyler@haifire.com)

Chapter 6: Fire Patterns

Chapter 6 will include literature research on work done by the scientific community to validate the interpretations discussed in the Fire Patterns chapter.  If you wish to contribute to the discussion, contact:

Task Group Chair: John Comery (John.Comery@ATF.gov)

Chapter 12: Safety

Chapter 12 will be updated to include work on medical concerns related to the fire investigation community and to include discussions on Fire Scene Site Safety Programs such as Hazardous Communication Programs.  If you wish to contribute to the discussion, contact:

Task Group Chair: Ron Hopkins (Ron.Hopkins@eku.edu)

Chapter 15: Origin Determination and Chapter 16: Cause Determination

Chapter 15 and 16 will be rewritten to make them conform to the steps of the Scientific Method.  If you wish to contribute to the discussion, contact:

Task Group Chair: John Lentini (fire@atslab.com)

Chapter 22: Motor Vehicle Fires

Chapter 22 will be studied to determine if that chapter needs updating as a result of model changes in the last three years.  If you wish to contribute to the discussion, contact:

Task Group Chair: Tom DeSantis (tdesanti@ford.com)

Chapter 24: Management of Major Investigations

Chapter 24 will be completely re-written to make it more applicable to real-world situations.  If you wish to contribute to that discussion, contact:

Task Group Chair: Pat Kennedy (pkennedy@kennedy-fire.com)

New Chapter: Marine Fire Investigation

A new chapter is being developed to address fire investigation on small and medium size water craft.  If you wish to contribute to that discussion, contact:

 Task Group Chair: David Smith (dmsmith@assocfire.com)

As you can see, there are several changes happening in the next edition and the Task Groups are busy at work to get them drafted by the deadline.  As we currently stand, the schedule dates posted on this web page will hold true for anyone wishing to participate in the NFPA process for the next edition of NFPA 921.  These dates may change if the NFPA process changes (more on that shortly).  Otherwise, you must have your submissions done by these dates.

For your information, the NFPA Standards Council has changed the rules, which has caused the next edition of NFPA 921 to be postponed from early 2007 until 2008.  The NFPA decided to drop their Fall Meeting and have one meeting per year in June.  NFPA 921 has always been in the Fall cycle, so we needed to either move our issue date to the Spring 2007 cycle or the Spring 2008 cycle.  Since the work load this edition is great, the Technical Committee chose to let the deadline for the next edition extent into the 2008 calendar year to give us more time.  The result is we will have four years before our next edition is on the streets.

The schedule for the Technical Committee’s meetings for 2005 is as follows:

Lexington, KY:                         March 2 through 4

Denver, CO:                             May 18 through 20

Minneapolis, MN:                    September 14 through 16

Site unknown:                         November 2 through 4

The November meeting is a tentative meeting to complete any unfinished business.  Where it will be held will be decided later in 2005.  You should know that all Technical Committee meetings are open to the public.  You should notify the committee chair and the staff liaison if you plan to attend to insure that there is room.  If you wish to present to the Technical Committee, you need to inform the chair before the start of the meeting.  The NFPA has specific rules on this topic.  If you have questions you can contact the NFPA at www.nfpa.org or you can contact:

Frank Florence at fflorence@nfpa.org (NFPA Liaison to NFPA 921 TC)

Dan Churchward at dchurchward@kodiakconsulting.com (Chair of TC)

Of course, you can always reach us at www.KodiakConsulting.com.