Burning Matters: 2024 in review

As the year has reached its final day, we want to take a moment to reflect on the immense growth and engagement that have shaped the Burning Matters newsletter.

The idea for a newsletter sparked in the early months of the year and had fully ignited into reality by the spring of 2024. In April, Burning Matters launched with the intention of bringing digestible tidbits and the latest updates on fire engineering to the greater masses. 

In order to create Burning Matters, I needed to assemble a team. For something as personal as a newsletter, I wanted to do this with people I had worked with before, who knew my style and work, and who were familiar with the industry.

I met Michael in 2016, which was the first of the five years that I spent as a Professor of Fire Safety Engineering at The University of Edinburgh. Michael did his fourth-year thesis on Spacecraft Fire Safety with me as a supervisor, strongly supported by Ulises Rojas-Alva. Michael later went on to work as a fire engineer in London at AECOM and now works in AI. Michael and I have kept in contact all these years, and it made sense for him to handle all our technical requirements at Burning Matter (platform management, graphics, videos, AI, IT, etc.). It is obviously a significant bonus that he has a background in fire engineering and academia alongside me.

I met Gizelle during her second stab at the IMFSE admissions in form of conducting her interview (Note: did you know that all IMFSE students are interviewed before admission to the program?). Call it fate but as I was asking her what she was currently reading, she quipped "A book on material science called Stuff Matters". She did very well in the interview, and I recommended her for admissions with a scholarship. Fast forward to today, with me having read the book and thoroughly enjoyed it, this title became the inspiration for the name of our newsletter. In 2022, I finally met Gizelle in person during the IMFSE program's 10-year anniversary (slightly postponed due to COVID). Shortly after, she joined the FRISSBE team at ZAG in Slovenia as our first summer intern. Her stint as our first student intern paved the way for future interns. As they say, the rest is history - she is now working as a fire engineer in Arup and is passionate in advocating fire safety be it in her work or for the Burning Matters newsletter.

Together, we’ve tackled important topics that are strongly identified as emerging challenges in the fire safety community with a wide range of topics:

The flame grows stronger

From its launching, Burning Matters has now grown to be a strong community of over 1750 subscribers! This incredible milestone reflects the shared passion of thousands of fire enthusiasts all over the world - let more of them know and tell them to subscribe. This also shows a deep sense of curiosity and a growing demand for fire knowledge, especially on topics that are often overlooked. With this, Burning Matters pledges to find more ways to reach the wider audience and continue to bring unconventional topics to the table.

In the last half of the year, we boosted community engagement by introducing guest writers. With contributions from more than 10 talented individuals—ranging from fire safety students to academics to industry consultants—we have added depth and diversity to our content. The collaborations have received positive feedback from our reader base as our contributing authors have shared their expertise and viewpoints on various fire subject matters.

The top newsletters according to our reader base

The top three Newsletters this year have been, not surprisingly, related to PV, batteries and mass timber. Though these numbers also reflect that there is a continuously growing subscriber base, I want to highlight that these three newsletters were all written by IMFSE students while (or a bit after) being FRISSBE summer interns. These three newsletters and the authors are shown below - click on the pictures for access to the top newsletters.

What’s to come in 2025

We have an exciting lineup of guest writers and engaging topics for the new year. Here is a sneak peek of topics lined up for 2025:

• Dust explosions

• Car fire blankets

• Façade fire safety

We are open to new collaborations and recommendations for topics as well. We are interested to hear your thoughts through our Burning Matters feedback form - or by contacting me directly (email or LinkedIn).

To each of our dear readers and subscribers, a heartfelt thank you for being part of the growing and thriving Burning Matters community. Every click, share, comment, and feedback is a meaningful step towards transforming how we understand fire and influence the policies that shape this field.

We hope for your continued support in 2025, and we wish you and your families a fire-safe holiday.

Warmly,
Gizelle, Michael and Grunde

PS. Let us know your favourite topic from 2024—reply in our feedback form or engage with us on social media.