Over the summer a number of our cohort decided to undertake a fire safety engineering related internship to gain an understanding of how the knowledge which we are gaining throughout the program can be applied in practice. Some of these students have been kind enough to share their experiences. I’ve decided to split this blog post into two more digestible parts; lookout for Part 2 next week.
Whilst choosing to undertake an internship can increase the burden of red tape which you are required to navigate (visa requirements in particular), these experiences provide valuable insight into the professional fire engineering industry.
Also, a big thank you is needed for the companies who provided these internship positions and for the knowledge they imparted.
First up we have Sandesh and Leo sharing their internship experiences.
Sandesh
Where did you undertake an internship?
Fire Engineered Solutions Ghent.
Have you previously had any sort of professional fire engineering experience? Was this internship different than what you might have anticipated?
No, I did my undergraduate in Mechanical Engineer and after that I was working in the sector of HVAC. Yes, this internship was helpful and I was able to model some geometry on Pyrosim (an FDS software) for an ongoing project of Brussels airport.
What sort of activities did you undertake during your internship?
- I worked on Pyrosim for the company on their ongoing project of Brussels Airport.
- I am currently writing a report that gives an overview of analytical design methodologies and the input parameters that are usually required by the engineer to design the smoke and heat control system.
The aim of the report is that the reader after reading the document would be able to choose the best analytical method for the design of smoke and heat control depending on the fire scenario and the type of building. Moreover, the reader should be able to find the most probable fire sources for the specified type of building.
Can you briefly describe your favourite/most interesting task you performed?
The favourite part for me was to work on Pyrosim. I never worked on this software before so I had to start from the initial stage and since I love working on the modelling software, I enjoyed it a lot and my supervisor was understanding enough to allow me to play with the geometry and instructed me wherever I got stuck.
Do you have any advice for future IMFSE students regarding internships?
Even though it’s not mandatory, try finding one for the summer break. It gives you an idea as how we have to deal with fire-related problems in practical fire engineering scenarios. And hey, you get to add it up in the resume.
Leo
Where did you undertake an internship?
During the summer, I worked with the Institute for Applied Fire Safety Research (IFAB) in Berlin, Germany. They used to be the research and development department of Fogtec. They are located in the northern part of the city a bit outside the center. I was not exactly situated in a certain department at IFAB as the team does not consist of that many people and the transition between the teams and their tasks are rather smooth.
Have you previously had any sort of professional fire engineering experience? Was this internship different than what you might have anticipated?
I haven’t had any previous working experience in the field of fire safety engineering specifically but spent previous years working as a research associate in material sciences at my Alma Mater in Cologne, Germany, giving me general working and quite a lot of lab experience in the field of engineering. The working tasks during my time at IFAB now and how they needed to be tackled have been more or less as I would have expected them to be. However, one experience stands out that you cannot get everywhere [Authors note; Leo is sworn to secrecy regarding these details despite my attempts to twist his arm].
What sort of activities did you undertake during your internship?
I was involved in different services offered by the company as modelling different fire scenarios in underground structures in FDS as a part of egress concepts, developing fire safety concepts for existing structures (requiring inspections of the site) and fire testings for extinguishing systems in the industry.
Can you briefly describe your favourite/most interesting task you performed?
I think from the list in my previous answer it is pretty obvious which of the activities that I was involved in might have been the most interesting. Working with real fire, for scientific reasons of course, is always exciting. I was stationed at the testing site of IFAB for a week participating in the process for the certification of a high-pressure water mist system. Fire tests are often necessary to get certification for the industrial use of extinguishing systems for a lot of applications. Since the droplets used in water mist are so small (we are talking µm-scales) and the dynamics therefore become very complex when fire and fire-induced flows enter the game it is not always possible to make viable, cost- and time-efficient predictions about the efficiency of an extinguishing system used for a new application without conducting real-scale fire tests.
It was really interesting to get to know how new systems can get certified and what parties are involved in the process (client company, insurers, testing laboratory…).
Do you have any advice for future IMFSE students regarding internships?
I say: Do it. If you want to apply what you already learned in your first year, get an insight on working practices in the industry and get some working experience in FSE, an internship during the summer of your IMFSE journey is the right thing to do. If you get the chance to do it in another country than where you come from, then it will also add further to your international experience. A good way to find an internship might also be to check the companies from the sponsor consortium of the IMFSE.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
If you want to do an internship, but don’t end up with a spot in the end – don’t be too sad. The working life, unfortunately, has some drawbacks, too. When meeting up with people from your batch or hearing from them and how they spend the summer travelling across Europe, one can definitely get very jealous while sitting in the office on a rainy day. I am already looking forward to reunite with the others (sadly only with half of our class) to go to Edinburgh together. See you there!
IMFSE 