Heritage Buildings Fires: Their challenges and consideration of fire safety protection

Abstract

Heritage buildings represent state of the art at the time of their construction. Materials used that are often viewed critically today concerning fire safety. Preventive measures and any other active systems can prevent untoward incidences to heritage buildings. So, for a sound fire safety concept, several considerations can be made. Hence, by reviewing two heritage buildings that involved in the fire which are Shuri Okinawa Castle and Paris Notre Dame Cathedral, this paper is aimed to establish challenges faced by historical building in the event of a fire by referring to the selected case study and to determine whether minimal intervention imposed in passive fire protection provided in the premises is a good practice so that can be referred by others heritage buildings.