Field trials were conducted in 1988 to evaluate the effectiveness of Steinernema (=Neoaplectana) carpocapsae (Weiser) in controlling the fire ant. Infective juveniles (IJ) of the nematode were applied as drench on 235 and 422 mounds, respectively for 2-month summer and 6-week fall evaluation periods. In comparative trials, amidinohydrazone (Amdro) was applied to 249 (summer) and 65 (fall) active mounds, with 245 (summer) and 78 (fall) untreated active as controls. Nematode treatments resulted in an average of 47% control (Abbott's formula) in summer trials and 19-88% control in the fall trials, compared with 39% and 47% control, respectively with amidinohydrazone. Active mounds treated with nematodes or amidinohydrazone had significantly fewer individuals than control mounds in summer trials.

Although concrete tunnel structures can lose strength and long-term durability due to fire, the literature on the remaining capacity of structures after fire events is very scattered, and no published post-fire inspection protocols specifically for concrete tunnel structures are available. This work aims to summarize and synthesize the current state of knowledge of the deleterious effects of fire on the residual condition of concrete tunnel structures and how the extent and degree of fire damage can be assessed. The scope of this work includes an extensive literature review, heat testing of some common tunnel elements, and residual strength testing of a tunnel wall panel. The literature review includes a review of published standards, technical reports, academic papers, and a survey of post-fire inspection practices at other state DOTs and transit organizations. Topics covered in the review include the residual mechanical properties of concrete, steel, and the concrete/steel bond after fire, the residual strength and stiffness of structural members after fire, existing inspection tools and methods for assessing concrete structures after fire, and repair methods for fire-damaged concrete structures. The outcomes of the heat testing are presented, including the setup of a radiant heating system (which does not use a flame), procurement of sample specimens for testing, thermal and physical testing of specimens, and evaluation of results. Lastly, based on the literature review and experimental testing, recommendations for future work are presented.

Elinor Ostrom challenges the view that states and markets alone have the potential to successfully regulate policymaking processes regarding long term sustainability of natural resources, promoting self-governing institution and communities in governing commons. Forestry management is concerned with administrative, social, environmental and economic aspects on forests and forestry resources, which in particular climates require adaptive measures accordingly with local environmental conditions. In Australia the fire-prone clima- te requires the inclusion of efficient and long-term sustainable fire management practices in order to protect ecosystems, natural resources and the population. Recent events such as destructive fire seasons and global spread of diseases brought attention to efficiency of current management strategies and promote the inve- stigation of indigenous and traditional knowledge, seen with potential for long-term sustainability, ecosy- stem restoration, and climate mitigation. Aboriginal fire management practices undertaken in the Kimberley Region and the Northern Territory of Australia are investigated and evaluated accordingly with socio-eco- nomic, environmental and societal standards, to create an overall scenario where fire is understood as a common resource, manageable and equally valuable as water and land. If seen as a common and managed as such, fire can be beneficial for long term sustainability, with the potential to address biodiversity conser- vation, resource management practices, and climate change mitigation.

Disturbance is one of the central concepts explaining how diversity arises and is perpetuated in ecological time. A good model system for testing hypotheses related to disturbance is the longleaf pine ecosystem in the southeastern U.S. because in this ecosystem frequent, low-severity fires acts as a disturbance that maintains a unique vegetation structure and high species richness. Vegetation structure influences animal distributions; in fire-dependent ecosystems many animals rely on open-structured, fire-maintained vegetation but shrubs and trees encroach into fire-dependent ecosystems where fire has been excluded. Prescribed burning and mechanical removal are commonly used as restoration tools to control encroachment. To better assess and compare the restoration potential of these tools, a more thorough understanding of how they change vegetation structure and habitat suitability for animals is necessary. The southeastern U.S. is a diversity hot-spot for amphibians, many of which require ephemeral wetlands embedded in longleaf pine uplands for the aquatic phase of their life cycle. Amphibian diversity has been declining in recent decades and habitat loss/degradation has been cited as one of the leading causes. Although often overlooked in studies of fire ecology, the ephemeral wetlands required by many amphibians are also fire-dependent habitats that have been negatively impacted by lack of fire. To understand how disturbance interacts with wetland vegetation and aquatic-phase amphibians, three disturbance treatments meant to mimic the effects of natural disturbance on vegetation structure were applied randomly to 28 dry ephemeral iii wetlands in the Lower Coastal Plain of South Carolina, U.S. The treatments consisted of early growing-season prescribed fire, mechanical vegetation removal (a proposed fire surrogate), and a combination of mechanical removal plus fire; some sites were left untreated for reference. Vegetation structure was quantified and amphibian assemblages were monitored before and after treatments. In addition, one species of amphibian was used in a tadpole survival experiment to examine differences in performance among treatments. Other factors that could be affected by treatments and in turn influence amphibians were measured, including water chemistry, wetland depth, quantity and quality of epilithon, and leaf litter composition. Amphibian survival was lowest, and species depauperateness highest in untreated wetlands. Depauperateness of species whose range was restricted to the range of longleaf pine was lowest in sites that had mechanical treatment plus fire. The mechanical plus fire treatment created the most open vegetation structure with lowest leaf litter accumulation, especially of hardwood litter, conditions correlated with high amphibian survival and diversity. When data from this study was combined with data from a previous study of similar nearby wetlands, a pattern emerged in which one suite of species was absent from recently burned sites, while an entirely different suite of species was absent from long-unburned sites. This evidence suggests that disturbance is related to a shift in amphibian assemblage possibly due to changes in vegetation structure and perhaps wetland ecology in general, from an algal-based system maintained by frequent fire to a detrital-based system that develops in the absence of fire

The purpose of this research was first to study the Wildland-Urban Interface and Wildland-Urban Intermix (WUI) fire problem, and then to design, develop and implement improved fire assessment and fire protection features for structures in the these interface fire-prone areas. The findings included that several areas of the world are prone to devastating fires that claim lives and destroy property, and their fire problems continue to exacerbate. None of these compare to the property loss experienced in Southern California due to its vast development in fire prone areas. It is because of the continuing huge property loss and frequency of major WUI fires that Southern California was selected as the concentration for research and the case studies used in this paper. However, the results of the research are applicable to other interface fire-prone areas in the world. The author is motivated by a need to dramatically improve our ability to effectively deal with what is no longer a fire “threat,” but the reality that people have chosen to live in an area of the world in which wildland fires are part of natural forest dynamics. To reduce the economic and social impacts of these inevitable fires, we need to understand the causes of fire damage, and establish methods to minimize damage when fires occur. This thesis proposes several fire protection strategies for increased fire resiliency and safety of individuals. Following a search of fire history and analysis, three related fire assessment matrixes were synthesized (see Chapter Five). The Fire Profile Index is the principal fire assessment matrix. It was developed empirically and applied to historical fire spreads for a sense of accuracy. The intended users of the Fire Profile Index are design professionals, public agencies charged with oversight for development in the WUI, insurance agencies, building and landscape contractors, homeowners, potential homeowners, residents and fire service professionals. From the Fire Profile Index two derivative special-use matrixes were established for use by diverse groups. The first of these matrixes, the Developers Guide, is intended for design professionals, public agencies, insurance agencies, and building and landscape contractors. The second matrix is the WUI Fire Assessment Guide, whose intended users are those concerned with development in high fire hazard areas, who should have a fundamental knowledge of fire behavior. This group includes fire agencies, developers, homeowners, potential homeowners and insurance companies. This thesis contributes to increased residential structure fire resistiveness and occupant fire safety in the WUI, by proposing site-specific fire assessment and corresponding design features in both structures and landscapes. Chapter Seven covers the development of noncombustible fire shields to divert airflow and diminish flames and embers blown towards structures. Wind tunnel modeling research was conducted at the Aerospace Program’s wind tunnel at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.

The synthesis and fire retardancy of several bromoesters of 2,4-pentadienoic acid were investigated. The synthesis of 2,4-pentadienoic acid was accomplished by liquid phase reaction of acrolein and malonic acid in the presence of pyridine. The conversion of the acid to bromoesters was performed by two different procedures. In the first procedure, the corresponding acid chloride was prepared from the acid via reaction with SOCl2 in the presence of powdered (3A°) molecular sieves. The molecular sieves serve as an internal trap for by-product HC1 and inhibit the competing polymerization reaction of the acid chloride. Reaction of the acid chloride with various alcohols provided the unsaturated esters. The final step in the first procedure is total bromination of the unsaturated esters. The second procedure involved bromination of 2,4-pentadienoic acid and followed by reaction of the bromo acid with SOCl₂ to produce the corresponding bromo acid chloride. Reaction of the brominated acid chloride with alcohol provided the corresponding brominated esters. A simple laboratory test was developed to measure and compare the flame retardancy of the bromoesters.

A methodology is developed to determine the locations of the fewest number of fire stations at an airport such that two guidelines, recommended to the Federal Aviation Administration, are met. The first guideline stipulates that airport fire vehicles must be capable of reaching any potential crash site on the runway system within a two minute time period. The second guideline requires stations to be located such that the chance of possible blockage of vehicle response routes to potential crash sites is minimized. The methodology transforms an initial continuous facility location problem into a discrete problem. By modeling the discrete formulation as a modified set covering problem, a solution is determined that meets the two guidelines. To illustrate the utility of the methodology, it is applied to two situations at the Atlanta Airport. In the first situation it is assumed that no fire stations exist at the airport, and in the second, three of the four fire stations planned to be in existence at the airport are assumed to be in operation. For both situations, the methodology is applied three times, changing the average speed vehicles are assumed to be capable of traveling on the runway system each time. For an average speed of 40 m.p.h., it is shown that fire vehicles, responding from the four stations at the airport, are not capable of reaching every potential crash site on the runway system within a two minute time period. / Master of Science

Denna slutrapport beskriver projektarbetet Funktionsbeskrivning av Brandlarms-styrningen av Ventilationssystemet ombord Korvett av Göteborgsklass som beställdes av divisionsingenjören vid 41.korvettdivisionen. Bakgrunden till projektets beställning var att fartygens dokumentation över ventilationssystemets funktion vid brand var bristfällig vilket försvårade underhåll, felsökning och utbildning av och på systemet. Den ofullständiga dokumentationen var ett resultat av att individerna i fartygs­klassen modifierats i flera olika omgångar utan att dokumentationen uppdaterats på ett tillfredsställande sätt. Det hade även framkommit att det fanns olikheter i konfigurationen av fartygsindividernas system. Projektet genomfördes dels genom studier av den befintliga dokumentation som fanns att tillgå ombord och på divisionen, dels genom praktiska under­sökningar ombord på fartygen. Under de praktiska undersökningarna framkom behov av ytterligare utredningar än de som ursprungligen framgick av det erhållna uppdraget. Projektet påvisade skillnader mellan fartygens system, vissa förmodat felaktiga styr­ningar av fläktar och spjäll samt fastställde att dokumentationen var bristfällig. Projektet resulterade i ett antal beskrivande dokument som sammanställdes i en pärm för respektive fartyg. Dessa uppfyller det givna uppdraget och målen med projektet. En större modifiering av fartygen i klassen med syfte att förlänga deras operativa livslängd är under planeringsstadiet. Under modifieringen skall bland annat fartygens dokumen­tation uppdateras, något som resultaten från detta projekt kommer underlätta. / This is the final report regarding the project A Functional Description of the Fire Alarm Con­trol in the Ventilation System aboard the Swedish Navy’s Gothenburg-class Corvettes, wh­­ich was commissioned by the Senior Marine Engineer Officer of the 41st Corvette Sq­­ua­d­ron of the 4th Naval Warfare Flotilla. The reason for the commission was that the set of documentation concerning the function of the ventilation system in case of a fire was insufficient. This caused problems, both during maintenance work done to en­­­su­re that the system was operating in accordance with the design parameters, as well as when trouble-shooting the system. The insufficient set of documentation was a result of a number of upgrades done to the ships over the ye­ars without any corr­e­s­p­on­ding up­date of the documentation. During the project it has also been made clear that there were non-documented differences existing be­­tween the ships in the class. The project was fulfilled by a combination of studies of the existing set of do­cumen­tation and practical surveys aboard the ships. During the surveys, more short­comings in the existing set of documentation became evident. The project demonstrated differences between the individual ships, assumed inaccuracies in the control of fans and dampers and determined the shortage in the set of documentation. The project has resulted in a number of describing documents that are collected in one unique file for each ship. These documents fulfil the commission and the objectives of the project. A major upgrade of the ships in the class with the purpose of extending their operational lifetime is now being planned. The ships’ set of documentation will be simultaneously updated, a task that will be simplified with the support of the results of this project.

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