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Traditional visual inspections often miss hidden damage caused by extreme heat. In our latest open-access paper, we propose a novel methodology that combines:

Experimental diagnostics (laser scanning, core sampling, microscopy)

CFD fire simulations (using FDS)

Thermomechanical finite element analysis (SAFIR and ANSYS)

We applied this to a real-world case: a precast RC warehouse in Cagliari (Italy) severely damaged by fire. The results revealed critical structural degradation not visible to the naked eye and enabled data-driven decisions for retrofitting.

This work advances performance-based fire engineering by integrating field data with high-fidelity simulations to evaluate residual structural capacity.

Read the full paper: https://doi.org/10.1680/jfoen.25.00027

Authors:
Flavio Stochino, Arnas Majumder, Balamurali Kanagaraj, Nicola Sara, Alessio Serra, Fausto Mistretta