Congratulations to our 2019 Award Recipients

Congratulations to our 2019 Fire Protection Industry Award winners. We would like to thank you for your commitment to excellence and for your outstanding contribution(s) to the Fire Protection Industry.

Thank you also to all of our finalists, we look forward to seeing your nominations for 2020!

Firas Shawash

Emerging Fire Protection Leader

Firas’ career began in 2005 after he completed a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering. He was listed in the university and the deans' honour lists. In 2008, after migrating to Australia, Firas completed a master’s degree in Building Fire Safety and Risk Engineering. He became the first Jordanian to hold a degree in fire engineering. In 2013 Firas became a Chartered Professional Engineer and was registered on the National Engineer’s Register, NER (Mechanical Engineering and Fire Safety Engineering) after only 4 years of experience, becoming one of the youngest NERs in fire engineering in Australia.In 2017, Firas was nominated for the Fire Protection Industry Awards in the young achiever category and later for many other industry awards.In 2019, Firas was selected for the NEXTgen 2019-2020 training program, sponsored and organized by Standards Australia and comprises 20 of the best professionals from all over Australia who it is believed will shape the future of the standardization processes supporting Australian industry and government.Currently, Firas works for i-Fire Engineers in Sydney. Upon joining the company, he was quickly promoted, ultimately becoming the technical manager of the NSW office, where his primary responsibility is to provide cost-effective performance-enhancing solutions under the Building Code of Australia for different classes of buildings with different issues.

Stephen Caple

Barry Lee Technical Excellence

Stephen's career in Fire Protection began in 1980 as a Sprinkler Fitter working for Guardian Fire Protection (the old one - not the current Guardian) then Pekon Fire. He joined the NSW Fire Brigade in 1985 and became a full time firefighter. In early 1989 Stephen decided to leave the Fire Brigade & return to the Fire Sprinkler Industry full time as a Sprinkler Fitter. He worked as a project manager and then added sales & estimating. Later in 1989 he moved to Melbourne to establish the Victorian branch of Metropolitan Fire Systems until returning to Sydney in 1995. This company was then acquired by Tyco in the late 90,s where he continued to work as a Project Manager on major projects until taking up the role as manager of Firepipe, the Tyco pipe shop in 2001 & stayed there until 2006. In 2006 he took up the role as drawing office manager for Wormald Sydney. In 2010 he moved to Tyco Technical Services. In 2016 Tyco sold Wormald Stephen continued to the present day working for Wormald Technical Services providing technical support to the Wormald fire business nationally. He represent Wormald on TAC 4/8/9 & TAC 11/22, he also represents FPA Australia at Standards Australia on FP4 & FP11. Stephen has an FPAS accreditation for Fire Sprinkler Systems & Fire Hydrant & Hose Reel Systems.

Warren Smith & Partners

Fire Protection Project of the Year (over $1 million)

Warren Smith & Partners provide industry leading engineering design solutions in Hydraulic Services, Fire Services and Civil Services. Our mission is to meet your high expectations in quality, time and budget. In addition, we are a Sydney Water Accredited Water Servicing Co-ordinator assisting you with Design Project Management and Building Plan Approvals.

Azzo Project Services

Fire Protection Project of the Year (under $1 million)

Azzo Project Services offer clients a full service over areas that would quite often require numerous trades to complete. They can offer a full range of passive fire solutions including the design, installation, commissioning and certifying of Fire Resistant Doors, Smoke Doors, Fire and Smoke Barriers, Fire Dampers, Fire Stopping Elements (service penetrations) Ceiling Hatches and Access Panels Fire Shutters Structural Fire Resistant Elements Azzo Project Services have the technical knowledge and on-site experience to deliver all your passive fire needs in a time effective and cost efficient manner.

Greene Fire

Harry Marryatt Fire Protection Company of the Year (1 - 49 Employees)

Greene Fire are industry leading manufacturers of fire engineered solutions. Based in Australia since 2000, Greene Fire creates unique solutions for any fire safety need with our industry leading fire safety products. Through its rapid development within the construction industry, Greene Fire has provided solutions for buildings such as the Sydney Opera House, Monash University, and many more.

Crown Melbourne

Harry Marryatt Fire Protection Company of the Year (50+ Employees)

The Engineering & Maintenance Team at Crown Melbourne supervises the overall maintenance of the Southbank facility using a combination of in-house and external contractors in a building that never sleeps. Crown successfully maintains the facility to provide a safe and pleasant experience to approximately 21 million visitors to the complex each year.Crown Melbourne is Australia’s leading integrated resort, featuring luxury accommodation and award-winning dining, world-class gaming, conferencing, shopping and entertainment facilities. The Engineering & Maintenance Team at Crown Melbourne manages all facility services throughout 3 hotel towers and an entertainment complex covering over 500,000m2 of floor space. Crown’s 1600 hotel rooms provide a safe and comfortable stay for more than 878,000 guests per year. Our conferencing facilities continue to be at the forefront of events in Australia with over 1,500 events and conferences booked for the year, with capacity for up to 2500 guests at some events.Crown Melbourne remains Victoria’s largest single-site private sector employer, with almost 12,000 people working across the resort.

FLAIM Systems

Innovative Product & Technology Award

FLAIM Extinguisher is a training tool that can be integrated into current training programs. This product equips those being trained with real-world skills with no environmental impact and no chemical exposure. It also allows trainers to run fire extinguisher training more often and it better prepares those being trained to take action in an emergency. Those being trained experience learn how to extinguish a fire, learn which extinguisher type should be used for a particular fire in a number of virtual environments including a kitchen, warehouse, office, manufacturing facility – all from one place. Fully transportable and easy to setup FLAIM Extinguisher can be run anywhere.

Rod Rose

Ron Coffey Award for Excellence in Bushfire Protection

Rod has worked in the bushfire industry for over 45 years; 17.5 yrs with NSW NPWS, 6 yrs as Fire Control Officer (Shoalhaven City) and 25 yrs as a Bushfire Consultant (primarily in NSW, but nationally). He is currently the Senior Principal - Bushfire in Eco Logical Australia and has overseen, trained and QA'd the work of a large bushfire consulting team for 22 yrs.

He started a bushfire consulting company in 1994 (BES) and grew it to one of the largest specialist bushfire companies in Australia. In 2008 BES merged with Eco Logical Australia (ELA) and in 2017 with Tetra Tech. His Australian experience/expertise is now helping connect the bushfire protection needs of the USA and Australia e.g. Australian bushfire prevention approaches and Tetra Tech’s response and recovery https://www.tetratech.com/en/emergency-management-and-disaster-recovery.

Qazi Sami Razzaque

Young Achiever of the Year Award

In June 2016, after completing her Masters of Civil Engineering majoring in Structural Engineering and previously working in a structural design firm for more than 2 years, Qazi Sami joined the fire division of Remedial Building Services, now known as Permax. Qazi commenced as a Structural Engineer and Estimator and was the 4th member to join the small team. After 6 months in this role Qazi enrolled into the Victoria University course for Fire Safety Engineering to further develop her skills and knowledge of the fire protection industry. As the demand for Nullifire intumescent products grew, Qazi spearheaded the fire testing campaign to understand how Nullifire SC902 can improve fire rating levels on concrete and timber substrates. In January of this year Qazi was promoted to Technical Services Manager to oversee the technical team consisting of 3 engineers as well as administration staff. Qazi's focus is to develop the technical framework and compliance documentation for the new passive fire protection products being introduced into the market. This includes Aithon PV33, Typhoon intumescent bolt caps, Flexichar Hydrocarbon intumescent and pioneering a Carbon Fibre fire protection system. "It has been a privilege to grow with a company who once only dealt with Structural steel fire protection but now has a fire rating solution for almost every substrate".

Glenn Talbot

A.V. Viscogliosi Award

Over his career, Glenn has been a champion for high standards in routine service of fire protection. On top of running a successful business providing fire protection services to more than 12,000 sites around the country, Glenn has volunteered large amounts of time to improve the legislation and standards governing routine service of fire protection systems. As the Chair of Australian Standards Committee FP-001, they led the development of AS1851-2012, and the subsequent Amendment 1, which represented a major improvement to the standard.

Glenn is also a past Board member and President of FPA Australia, and is a member of the Facilities Management Association Australia.

Mark Whybro

Meritorious Service Award 2019

While the fire protection industry only began working with this individual in the past decade, this individual has worked in the fire and emergency services since 1981. During a long and illustrious career with the NSW Fire Brigades, and then Fire and Rescue NSW, this person has worked on several important campaigns to develop public awareness of fire safety, and improve the interface between fire and emergency services and the community.

They currently lead Fire and Rescue NSW’s prevention and community education programs, regulatory and advisory functions in the built environment, fire investigation, fire and human behaviour research, Automatic Fire Alarm unwanted alarms reduction and commercial emergency safety training

In recent years, this individual has worked closely with FPA Australia on one of the most significant improvements to fire safety in this country since the introduction of mandatory smoke alarms in homes.

Chris Wyborn

Meritorious Service Award 2019

FPA Australia staff do a huge amount of work on behalf of the industry and have had many great achievements over the year's. For the first time in the Associations history the Board have selected someone from the FPA Australia staff to be a recipient of the Meritorious Service Award. Chris's list of achievements and contributions are to long to list, but some highlights of his service are:

Overseeing the development of FPA Australia's routine service logboks
Instrumental in the refinement and expansion of the Bushfire Planning and Design Accreditation Scheme and its successful introduction in WA
Redevelopment of routine service training packages and state licensing reforms
Representation on a number of committees and working groups within the industry
Leadership of the Accreditation and Licensing offerings at FPA Australia

Chris was also a long service volunteer and professional firefighter with the CFA and was active on the ground during the Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria in 2009. He has been awarded the National Medal, the National Emergency Medal and the Long Service Medal from the CFA.

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