This dissertation examines the interdependence between urban water distribution
systems and urban fire response. The focus on interdependent critical infrastructures is
driven by concern for security of water systems and the effects on related infrastructures
if water distribution systems are damaged by terrorist attack or natural disaster.
A model of interdependent infrastructures (principally water distribution systems
and fire response) is developed called the Model of Urban Fire Spread (MUFS). The
model includes the capacity to simulate firefighting water demands in a community
water system hydraulic model, building-to-building urban fire spread, and suppression
activities. MUFS is an improvement over previous similar models because it allows
simulation of urban fires at the level of individual buildings and it permits simulation of
interdependent infrastructures working in concert.
MUFS is used to simulate a series of multi-mode attacks and failures (MMAFs) –
events which disable the water distribution system and simultaneously ignite an urban
fire. The consequences of MMAF scenarios are analyzed to determine the most serious modes of infrastructure failure and urban fire ignition. Various methods to determine
worst-case configurations of urban fire ignition points are also examined.
These MMAF scenarios are used to inform the design of potential mitigation
measures to decrease the consequences of the urban fire. The effectiveness of mitigation
methods is determined using the MUFS simulation tool. Novel metrics are developed to
quantify the effectiveness of the mitigation methods from the time-series development of
their consequences. A cost-benefit analysis of the various mitigation measures is
conducted to provide additional insight into the methods’ effectiveness and better inform
the decision-making process of selecting mitigation methods.
Planned future work includes further refinement of the representation of fire
propagation and suppression in MUFS and investigation of historical MMAF events to
validate simulation predictions. Future efforts will continue development of appropriate
optimization methods for determining worst-case MMAF scenarios.
This work should be of interest to water utility managers and emergency
planners, who can adapt the methodology to analyze their communities’ vulnerability to
MMAFs and design mitigation techniques to meet their unique needs, as well as to
researchers interested in infrastructure modeling and disaster simulation.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/ETD-TAMU-1082 |
| Date | 15 May 2009 |
| Creators | Bristow, Elizabeth Catherine |
| Contributors | Brumbelow, James Kelly |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Dissertation, text |
| Format | electronic, application/pdf, born digital |
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