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Flammability of Upholstered Furniture
Track(s): Research

Thomas Fabian, Underwriters Laboratories, Inc.

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Upholstered furniture has been one of the leading causes of firerelated injuries and fatalities in home structure fires for many years. Find out about an investigation that focused on the use of commercially available fire barriers and fire retardant foams in upholstered furniture to retard and/or reduce the fire growth rate resulting from exposure to small open flames. Combustibility data was collected for material-level tests, furniture mock-up tests, and full-size chair and sofa furniture tests. Results were analyzed in the context of room flashover conditions.

Thomas Fabian received his PhD from the University of Connecticut. He has been investigating fire growth and smoke and gas production as a part of Underwriters Laboratories' Corporate Research for the past 6 years. Currently, he manages the Fire Hazards Research Group.