ASTM_E_2061_-_15.pdf

Designation:E206115An American National StandardStandard Guide forFire Hazard Assessment of Rail Transportation Vehicles1This standard is issued under the fixed designation E2061;the number immediately following the designation indicates the year oforiginal adoption or,in the case of revision,the year of last revision.A number in parentheses indicates the year of last reapproval.Asuperscript epsilon()indicates an editorial change since the last revision or reapproval.INTRODUCTIONThe traditional approach to codes and standards is the specification of individual fire-test-responserequirements for each material,component,or product that is found in a given environment and isdeemed important to maintain satisfactory levels of fire safety.This practice has been in place for solong that it gives a significant level of comfort;manufacturers know what is required to comply withthe specifications and specifiers simply apply the requirements.The implicit assumptions are notstated,but they are that the use of the prescribed requirements ensures an adequate level of safety.There is no need to impose any change on those manufacturers who supply safe systems meetingexisting prescriptive requirements;however,as new materials,components,and products aredeveloped,manufacturers,designers,and specifiers often desire the flexibility to choose how overallsafety requirements are to be met.It is the responsibility of developers of alternative approaches tostate explicitly the assumptions being made which result in a design having an equivalent level ofsafety.One way to generate explicit and valid assumptions is to use a performance-based approach,based on test methods that provide data in engineering units,suitable for use in fire safety engineeringcalculations,as this guide provides.This fire hazard assessment guide focuses on rail transportation vehicles.Such a fire hazardassessment requires developing all crucial fire scenarios that must be considered and consideration ofthe effect of all contents and designs within the rail transportation vehicle,which will potentially affectthe resulting fire hazard.The intention of this guide is that rail transportation vehicles be designedeither by meeting all the requirements of the traditional prescriptive approach or by conducting a firehazard assessment,that needs to provide adequate margins of error,in which a level of safety isobtained that is equal to or greater than the level of safety resulting from the traditional approach.1.Scope1.1 This is a guide to developing fire hazard assessments forrail transportation vehicles.It has been written to assistprofessionals,including fire safety engineers,who wish toassess the fire safety of rail transportation vehicles,during orafter their design(see also 1.6).This guide is not in itself a firehazard assessment nor does it provide acceptance criteria;thus,it cannot be used for regulation.1.2 Hazard assessment is a process that results in anestimate of the potential severity of the fires that can developunder defined scenarios,once defined incidents have occurred.Hazard assessment does not address the likelihood of a fireoccurring.Hazard assessment is based on the premise that anignition has occurred,consistent with a specified scenario,andthat potential outcomes of the scenario can be reliably esti-mated.1.3 Consistent with 1.2,this guide provides methods toevaluate whether particular rail passenger designs provide anequal or greater level of fire safety when compared to designsdeveloped based on the traditional applicable fire-test-responsecharacteristic approaches currently widely used in this indus-try.Such approaches have typically been based on prescriptivetest methodologies.The following are examples of such lists ofprescriptive tests:the requirements by the Federal RailroadAdministration(FRA)(Table X1.1),the former guidelines ofthe FRA,the requirements of NFPA 130(Table X3.1),and therecommended practices of the Federal Transit Administration(FTA).Selective use of parts of the methodology in this guideand of individual fire-test-response characteristics from TableX1.1(or any other set of tests)does not satisfy the fire safetyobjectives of this guide or of the table.This guide shall be usedin its entirety to develop a fire hazard assessment for railtransportation vehicles or to aid in the design of such vehicles.1This guide is under the jurisdiction ofASTM Committee E05 on Fire Standardsand is the direct responsibility of Subcommittee E05.17 on Transportation.Current edition approved Nov.1,2015.Published December 2015.Originallyapproved in 2000.Last previous edition approved in 2012 as E2061 12.DOI:10.1520/E2061-15.Copyright ASTM International,100 Barr Harbor Drive,PO Box C700,West Conshohocken,PA 19428-2959.United States1 1.4 This guide includes and applies accepted and clearlydefined fire safety engineering techniques and methods consis-tent with both existing,traditional prescriptive codes andstandards and performance based fire codes