The Vinyl Council of Australia (VCA) has secured world-renowned fire expert Professor Richard Hull, Professor of Chemistry and Fire Science from the School of Natural Sciences, University of Central Lancashire, to lead an intensive four-day course on Hazards from Fire: Quantification of Fire Behaviour Fire Retardancy and Fire Toxicity.

Professor Hull is a leading expert in the behaviour of unwanted fire and has had over 100 published papers on the assessment and influence of fire retardants on flammability, the toxicity of fire smoke and effects of fire retardants on smoke toxicity.

He was also called upon as an expert witness following the tragic Grenfell Tower fire in London in 2017, where he led an independent study investigating the fire behaviour of common façade construction materials.

The short course, which will be held in Melbourne from 17 to 20 April 2023 at the Novotel Hotel, Preston, has been designed to introduce scientists and engineers to the fundamentals of fire behaviour. While unwanted fire costs economies in the developed world around 1% of GDP each year and the layout of cities and infrastructure are designed by architects and engineers to ensure fire safety, fire science remains a sparsely covered topic in the science and engineering curricula of modern universities.

Over four days the course will cover a wide range of areas in exploring fire behaviour including an introduction to fires and fire science, a look at polymer decomposition mechanisms and how it’s studied, interpretation of thermal analysis and cone calorimetry data, measurement of flammability and interpretation of results, fire retardants and hazards and lessons from real fires.

The course is fully catered and includes a dinner with Professor Hull on Wednesday 19 April 2023, while participants will also receive all lecture notes and a certificate of attendance following completion.

To find out more and register to attend this unique opportunity, visit this link or call VCA on 03 9510 1711.