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John Gales

Associate Professor, P.Eng

Department:

Civil Engineering

Phone Number: contact via email only - office phone not in use

Email: jgales@yorku.ca

Website: https://yorkufire.com/

Bio

Dr. John Gales is an Associate Professor at York University in the Department of Civil Engineering in Toronto, Canada where he leads their Fire Safety Engineering Research Group. Dr. Gales also performs duties as a visiting professor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Boston, USA, Queen’s University, Canada, University of Waterloo, Canada and Carleton University, Canada. He received his engineering doctorate from the University of Edinburgh in the United Kingdom in 2013. He is a registered Professional Engineer in Ontario, Canada. Dr. Gales’ primary research interests include resilient structural fire design, and human behaviour in emergency situations. His research is active in various international collaborations and student exchanges related to fire safety engineering research with the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, Imperial College London in the United Kingdom, and NIST in the USA. His students have been recipients of 97 major scholarships and research awards totaling more than $700,000. He has been recipient of 16 major NSERC Canada research grants in the last five years. His total awarded research funding has exceeded $2.3 million in his career. To date he has more than 230 scientific contributions. He was one of four Task Group Chairs in the Fire Protection Committee of the American Society of Civil Engineers for acceptance criterion development, the leading structural fire committee in the United States. He is currently voting member on the Canadian Board for Harmonized Construction Codes (CBHCC) Fire Protection committee; Chair of the committee on Fire Behaviour and Safety of Structures of the Canadian Society of Civil Engineers; Chair of Working Group 10 on Structural Steel Fire design in CSA (Canadian Standards Association); Associate Editor of Fire and Materials (John Wiley); Associate Editor Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering (Canadian Science Publishing); Editorial board of Fire Technology (Springer- Nature) and was Chair of the 2018 Workshop on Fire Resistance of Structures for ASTM International.

Interested students in joining the Yorkufire team as graduate or undergraduate researcher should review his past research at yorkufire.com and email Dr. Gales with a statement of relevant skills and experiences, career goals, and a note on your opinions on the topic of “Enhancing Equity, Inclusion and Diversity in Engineering”

Research Interests

See more about our team's current research at our Instagram handle instagram.com/yorkufire/ and our research group website at Yorkufire.com

  • Structural Fire Resilience
    • Timber structures and materials
    • Steel structures and materials
    • Concrete structures and materials
    • Heritage structures (all material types)
  • Human Behaviour in Emergencies
    • Developing countries and informal settlements
    • Wildland urban interface
    • Stadia
    • Cultural centres
    • Care homes
    • Transportation infrastructure (airports, rail)
    • Evacuation modelling
  • Fire Dynamics
    • Travelling fires and large compartments
  • Engineering Education
    • EDI
    • Retention of women in engineering

Selected Publications

Graduate students in bold, open access versions of papers available on the Yorkufire.com/publications. Accepted journal articles after 2020 are listed below.

  1. Al-Hamd, R., Gales, J. et al. (2023) Bond behaviour of rebar in concrete at elevated temperatures: A soft computing approach. Fire and Materials (John Wiley). (Accepted)
  2. Philion, E., Chorlton, B., Gales, J and Kotsovinos, P. (2022) Fire Modelling Strategies for Exposed Mass Timber Compartments and Experimental Gaps for Model Validation. Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities (ASCE). Invited paper. (Accepted)
  3. Watson, S., Nicoletta, B., Al-Hamd, R., Kotsovinos, P., Gales, J (2022) Modelling Thermal Performance of Unloaded Spiral Strand and Locked Coil Cables Subject to Pool Fires. Structural Engineering International (IABSE) (Accepted).
  4. Harun, G., Chorlton, C., Richter, F., and Gales, J. (2022). The Effects of Radial Cracks on the Fire Performance of Heritage Timber. Fire and Materials (John Wiley). (Accepted)
  5. Chin, K., Young, T., Chorlton, B., Aucoin, D., and Gales, J., (2022) Crowd Behaviour in Canadian Football Stadia - Part 1 - Data Collection. Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering (Canadian Science Publishing). 49 (7).
  6. Chin, K., Young, T., Chorlton, B., Aucoin, D., and Gales, J., (2022) Crowd Behaviour in Canadian Football Stadia - Part 2 - Modelling Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering (Canadian Science Publishing). 49 (7).
  7. Yerushalami, A., Folk, L., Carton, H., Gales, J., Khan A., Weckman, B. (2022) Fire Evacuation Modelling of a Canadian Wildland Urban Interface Community. Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering (Canadian Science Publishing). 49 (1).
  8. Davidson, A., and Gales, J (2021). BIM and Fire Safety Engineering – Overview of State of the Art. International Journal of High-Rise Buildings (CTBUH). 10(4): 251-263.
  9. Arce, S., Jeanneret,, Gales, J, Antonellis, D., and Vaiciulyte, S. (2021) Human Behaviour in Informal Settlement Fires in Costa Rica. Safety Science (Elsevier). 142. 105384.
  10. Young, T., Gales, J, Kinsey M, and Wong W. (2021) Variability in Stadia Evacuation under Normal, High-Motivation, and Emergency Egress. Journal of Building Engineering (Elsevier). 40.
  11. Gales, J. (2022) A Gallery of Fire and Combustion. Fire Technology (Springer-Nature). Invited review 58(2): 1061 – 1063.
  12. McNamee, R., Janssens, M., and Gales, J. (2021) Editorial for special issue on Interflam 2019: Mass timber and fire resistance. Fire and Materials (John Wiley). 45(7): 845-846.
  13. Chorlton, B., Forrest, B., Weckman, W., and Gales, J. (2021) Performance of Type X Gypsum Board on Timber to Non-standard Fire Exposure. Fire and Materials (John Wiley). 45(7): 885-900. (Awarded citation award – Wiley 2022)
  14. Jeanneret, C., Nicoletta, B, Gales, J. Robertson, L., and Kotsovinos P. (2021) Guidance for the post-fire structural assessment of prestressing steel. Engineering Structures (Elsevier). 235 (4).
  15. Nicoletta, B., Gales, J., Kotsovinos, P, and Weckman, E. (2021) Experimental Thermal Performance of Unloaded Spiral Strand and Locked Coil Cables Subject to Pool Fires. Structural Engineering International (IABSE). (accepted).
  16. Chorlton, B., and Gales, J. (2021) Structural Repair of Fire-Damaged Glulam Timber. Journal of Architectural Engineering (ASCE). 27 (1).
  17. Gales, J., Chorlton, B., and Jeanneret, C. (2021) The Historical Narrative of the Standard Time and Temperature Heating Curve for Structures. Fire Technology (Springer-Nature). Invited 57, 529–558. Springer- Nature Editor’s Choice Award 2021.
  18. Gales, J., Chorlton, B., and Jeanneret, C. (2022) Response to Vytenis Babrauskas “Comments on “The Historical Narrative of the Standard Temperature–Time Heating Curve for Structures” by Gales, et al.”. Fire Technology (Springer-Nature). 58 (1), 21-28.
  19. Chorlton, B., and Gales, J. (2020) Mechanical Performance of Laminated Veneer Lumber and Glulam Beams after Short-Term Incident Heat Exposure. Construction and Building Materials (Elsevier). 263 (12) :120-129.
  20. Folk, L., Gonzales, K., Gales, J., Kinsey, M, and Carratin, E. and Young, T. (2020) Emergency Egress for the Elderly in Care Home Fire Situations. Fire and Materials (John Wiley). 44(4): 595-606.
  21. Chorlton, B., and Gales, J. (2020) Fire Performance of Heritage and Contemporary Timber Encapsulation Materials. Journal of Building Engineering (Elsevier). 201(15).
  22. Gales, J (2020) Advancements in Evaluating the Fire Resistance of Structures. Fire and Materials (John-Wiley). 44(3), 297-298.
  23. LaMalva, K., Bisby, L., Gales, J., et al. (2020) Rectification of ‘Restrained vs. Unrestrained’, Fire and Materials. 44(3), 341-351. (Awarded citation award – Wiley 2022)
  24. Jeanneret, C., Gales, J., Kotsovinos, P, and Rein G. (2020) Acceptance Criteria for Unbonded Post-tensioned Concrete exposed to Travelling and Traditional Design Fires. Fire Technology (Springer-Nature). 56(3), 1229–1252.
  25. Quiquero H., Gales, J., Abu, T., and Al Hamd, R. (2020) Finite Element Modelling of Post-Tensioned Timber Beams in Ambient and Fire Conditions. Fire Technology (Springer-Nature).  56(2), 737-767.