By: The NFSA ’26 Interns: Jeremiah Allen, Wiley Hensley, Brooke Marshall, and Brookelynn Weinberg

Monday was Demo Day at the NFSA HQ. We also had the opportunity to learn more about the history of the NFSA with Shane Ray, NFSA President. Shane taught us how the organization has grown to support the fire sprinkler industry through education, advocacy, and training. One of the most memorable parts of the day was watching a side-by-side burn demonstration in one of NFSA’s burn trailers, which showed how quickly fire can spread and how important sprinkler protection is. The fire on the right side of the trailer was quickly put out by the sprinklers that were installed, but the fire without sprinklers overtook the whole room in a matter of minutes and advanced to flashover conditions. We also had time to work on our final presentation projects, so the day helped us connect what we have been learning throughout the internship to real demonstrations and our own research.

On Tuesday, we drove to Hagerstown, MD to visit two new warehouses. First, we toured Webstaurant, a 1.2 million square foot distribution center with modern Fire Protection. Through a close relationship with the Hagerstown Fire Department and Fire Marshal, the building has a modernized fire protection system that surpasses minimum requirements.  Bill Natali, the facilities manager, and Doug DeHaven, a local fire marshal, led the tour. We were shown the riser system, pumps, VESDA in automated storage, and much more. Most impressive was the storage of high hazard commodities. It was helpful to have the facilities manager and the fire marshal lead the tour, as we got both the facility and AHJ perspective. The takeaway was that a good relationship between AHJ and building owner/manager streamlines the approval process and leads to a more efficiently protected building. That day we also toured a four hundred thousand square foot automated cold storage system being built in Hagerstown by New Cold.

On Thursday, we went to Fairfax to the Fire Alarm and Sprinkler System Training (FASST) Lab. We learned about different fire detection methods and saw the development of fire detection through the years. We saw demonstrations about how the fire detection systems worked and how to reset a fire alarm panel. We then visited the pump room in the building where we learned what the equipment does and how to inspect, test, and maintain the systems. It was insightful seeing the fire protection system in action so we could have a better understanding of how all the components worked together. We then saw the wet, dry, preaction, and deluge valves at the facility and got to trip and practice resetting them. We then learned about gas-based and wet chemical suppression systems.

Thank you to Doug, Webstaurant, and FASST Labs for hosting us! We had a great time!

Code of the Week!

25.1.8.2 

Where two levels of in-rack sprinklers are required by the guidelines of this chapter and the vertical location of the in-rack sprinklers is not indicated in an applicable figure, in-rack sprinklers shall be installed at the first tier level at or above one-third and two-thirds of the highest expected storage height.