Abstract
Pakistan is recognized around the world for its heritage structures which represent the country’s glorious history. These structures are of distinctive architectural and cultural importance. They differ from each other in various aspects of their ornamentations, building fabric, design, and construction process; however, they were typically built without any concern towards fire safety. Worryingly, mortifying accounts of fire disasters have been reported from all over the world. Fire incidents and fire disasters in heritage sites of the world amplify the fact that this threat should be fully recognized and precautionary measures must be taken beforehand. For this purpose, the technique used in this study is called Fire Risk Index (FRI). It has been used internationally for cities with historical values, especially in Portugal. In this study, this technique was applied to 12 cultural heritage buildings of Lahore. A site visit was conducted to each structure. Based on the observations and data, the value of FRI was derived for each structure. Furthermore, the characterization of the buildings was also carried out in terms of fire risk. It was found that Sheesh Mahal and Lahore Museum have the highest fire risk and were classified as high-risk buildings. Overall, the heritage structures included in this study comprised 17% high-risk buildings, 33% moderate-risk buildings, and 50% low-risk buildings. In the same vein, propagation of fire (P) was determined as the most prominent sub-factor in evaluating the FRI values, as there are 67% of heritage structures in which the contribution of this sub-factor is more as compared to other sub-factors. This study contributes towards the development of intervention packages as an efficient tool for fire risk mitigation purposes in heritage structures