Fire Protection Equipment Demonstration Labs

Located at the National Emergency Training Center, the National Fire Academy Fire Protection Equipment Demonstration Labs offer students a "hands-on" opportunity to study equipment and devices they may see in their day-to-day work.

The "wet" lab includes ten different operating fire sprinkler and standpipe systems, a live-fire burn room, and mock-ups of specialty fire protection systems including Halon™, carbon dioxide and commercial kitchen hood and duct fire suppression equipment.

Students operating a standpipe system.

During classes, students are encouraged to operate the fire protection systems, and even dismantle and reassemble some of them, so they obtain a new understanding of how these systems are intended to operate. The live fire burn room is used to demonstrate the effectiveness of automatic sprinkler systems for protecting life and property.

Students witnessing a smoke control demonstration using National Towers.

The "dry" lab contains functional zoned and addressable fire alarm and detection systems, operating fire door and smoke damper assemblies, and National Towers, a scale-model three-story building used for smoke control system demonstrations.

Students from the Incident Management curriculum are encouraged to attend these classes to obtain a better understanding of the built environment.