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Kindling is a U.S. based tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in 2020 to support and inspire fire safety in vulnerable communities around the world. In 2024, Kindling also registered as a non-profit company in South Africa. Our interdisciplinary team of researchers and practitioners have extensive experience in engineering, planning, and social and physical sciences in diverse geographies and sectors, such as the architecture/engineering/ construction industry, international development, humanitarian sector, disaster risk reduction, and public safety. As our organization grows, we aim to become increasingly diverse in backgrounds, experiences, geographies, disciplines, and more.
Board of Directors
Danielle Antonellis
Founder & Executive Director
Danielle is the Founder & Executive Director of Kindling. She has a proven track record of establishing and leading cross-discipline and cross-region teams to tackle intractable problems. Before founding Kindling, Danielle was a Senior Fire Safety Consultant with Arup based in the US, UK, and Hong Kong. She led Arup’s global research program on fire safety in informal settlements and established a global multidisciplinary skills group called City Fire Resilience. Previous to Arup, Danielle was a Fire Suppression Systems Researcher and Technical Advisor at Johnson Controls (formerly Tyco). Danielle has a B.S. in Civil Engineering and a M.S. in Fire Protection Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.
Jim Kennedy
Chair of the Board
Jim has a PhD in refugee camp design, and more than 15 years field experience in disaster-preparedness, post-disaster shelter and settlements, and camp planning. Jim's experience in the field has included countries in Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, and Asia. Jim has worked for the UN, the Red Cross movement, and a number of international NGOs. Jim has also conducted research into fire safety and shelter for the UK government, and is involved in ongoing projects to integrate fire-safety planning with other aspects of safety and protection in camps.
Jim Quiter
Treasurer
Jim Quiter recently retired as a Principal at Arup, a global design, consulting and engineering firm. His last position with Arup was as Managing Principal of their Los Angeles office, a 300-person multi-discipline office with over $100 Million in revenue in his last year. Other positions at Arup have included being a member of their Board of Trustees, leading global management consulting, leading the Americas fire team, and leading the San Francisco and Chicago offices. Jim has also been an active volunteer. He is a member of the NFPA Standards Council, he is former Chairman of the NFPA Safety to Life Correlating Committee, and he is a Fellow and Past-President of SFPE. He is currently involved writing chapters for the latest editions of both the NFPA and SFPE Handbooks, and in teaching educational courses for SFPE.
David Beal
David is VP, Corporate Counsel with the Employment & Labor Law Department at Prudential. He provides counseling and training to internal HR and management clients regarding compliance with all federal and state employment and labor laws, including laws relating to workplace discrimination, harassment, retaliation, diversity and inclusion initiatives, and contingent workforce management. He has also conducted hundreds of fact-sensitive and intensive inquiries into allegations of discrimination, harassment, whistleblowing, retaliation, ethical violations, and violations of Company policies.
Noah Ryder
For over 20 years Dr. Noah Ryder has focused on understanding fire and explosion’s interaction with both built and natural environments. He presently serves as a Principal Engineer and Managing Partner at Fire & Risk Alliance, LLC. where he leads the Risk, Modeling, Applied Research, and Forensics group. He is a licensed professional fire protection engineer and focuses on how safety can be improved through the use of quantitative risk assessments, hazard evaluations, computer modeling, applied research, and performance-based design. Dr. Ryder has received numerous awards throughout his career and continues to serve the industry with his involvement in various safety focused organizations. He is the former chair of the Technical Committee of the SFPE Foundation and continues to serve as a board member, actively serves on multiple NFPA technical committees, is the former SFPE Chesapeake Chapter President, and frequently publishes and presents his work.
Liz Palmer
Liz is currently the Global Lead for Construction at INGO Save the Children (SCI), with a varied career in Private sector Architecture, as well as Humanitarian and Development experience with the UN and NGOs, in Shelter, Refugee Site Planning and cross-sector construction programming. She currently supports SCI Country Offices in implementing high quality and safe programming for construction, with a diverse area of accountability in Construction Project Management, Procurement, DRR, Climate Change Adaptation, Inclusive design, Safeguarding and Safety, though the rollout of Construction Policy and Standards. Fire Safety is a core component of this work, with remarkable examples of success such as the nation-wide Fire Risk Reduction project in Lebanon since 2016. Based in Cape Town, South Africa, Liz holds a MSc in Sustainability of the Built Environment, Diploma in Architectural Technology, and B:Tech Architecture Applied Design.
Darren Gill
Darren has 15+ years’ experience designing and delivering urban and economic development programs for organizations like the World Bank / IFC, UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, European Investment Bank, United Nations, and private foundations. He works as an integrator across disciplines and sectors to deliver policy recommendations, program design, urban strategies, project pipelines and infrastructure investment advice. His north star is grappling with urbanization and climate change.
Core Team
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Helen Underhill
Head of Educational Research and Delivery
Sandra Vaiciulyte
Senior Fire Safety Researcher
Kanyisile Brukwe
Project Manager
​Dr Helen Underhill is an educational researcher and practitioner. After over a decade teaching in high schools, she gained a PhD in International Development in 2017 that drew on this experience to explore informal and non-formal learning in social movements and community action. Having supported Operation Florian’s ‘train the trainer’ programme of work on fire risk in refugee settings with Save the Children in Lebanon in 2017, Helen went on to secure funding from the British Academy to research gender, fire risk and the possibilities for fire education in informal settlements in Lebanon (supported in her role as Senior Lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University). She and Laura Hirst are currently exploring this work together through co-writing. Helen is also interested in the possibilities generated through feminist and post-qualitative methodologies, and in the contribution of critical pedagogy to fire risk reduction and improved fire safety.
Dr Sandra Vaiciulyte is an interdisciplinary researcher in fire safety, and human response to natural hazards. She has a background in sociology, behavioural sciences, fire safety engineering, and international communication and development. Sandra is passionate about bringing together social science and engineering principles to improve safety in urban environments. During her PhD Sandra focused on human response to wildland-urban interface evacuations at the University of Greenwich, London, later joining Arup, London office, where she had hands on experience in fire safety in buildings projects, fire safety research and fire safety education for engineers. Currently Sandra is a postdoctoral researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).
Kanyisile, holding a Master’s Degree in political studies from the University of Western Cape, focuses on women's empowerment and reducing social injustice. With expertise in project management across research, dissemination, and impact, she brings a diverse background in fire safety research and experience in informal settlements. Proficient in social research and digital interventions, she excels in project planning, management, and implementation. Her global research collaborations have refined her writing skills for diverse audiences. Co-authoring academic papers on topics like domestic workers during COVID, she collaborates with institutions like the University of Edinburgh. Her current project on fire risk reduction, in collaboration with the University of Sheffield and the University of the Western Cape, aims to publish a co-authored book with UCL Press. Recognizing the importance of accessible research, Kanyisile co-created podcasts of their fire risk reduction work, shared within local social movements and international academic conferences.
Laura Hirst
Fire Safety Researcher
Laura Hirst is a PhD researcher at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, working in collaboration with Operation Florian. Her research investigates vulnerability to fire risk in low income settlements in Nairobi, Kenya, using qualitative methods to understand how everyday urban fire risk is created, experienced and responded to by different stakeholders. As well as her research in Kenya, Laura was a key member of the Operation Florian team which carried out a fire risk assessment of refugee settings for Save the Children Lebanon, and supports further research on gender and learning around fire risk response in resource poor urban settings.
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Sam Stevens
Fire Safety Engineer
Dr Sam Stevens is a fire engineering researcher with a PhD and an MEng in Structural and Fire Safety Engineering from the University of Edinburgh. His research focusses on physical fire spread in informal settlements – both capturing static fire risk profiles and developing dynamic fire spread models. This work dates back to his days as an undergraduate having won research scholarships from the University of Edinburgh and the Carnegie Trust. His involvement in experimental work has included burning several full-scale structures with Stellenbosch university. It has also included a number of lab-scale compartment fire tests focussing on ventilation conditions at Edinburgh, in partnership with researchers at University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. As a doctoral researcher at Edinburgh, he gained extensive teaching experience on a variety of courses, most notably Fire Science and Dynamics, Models for Fire Safety and Professional Development for Engineers.
Jennie Tsekwa
Organizational Development Consultant
Jennie is an OD practitioner, sociologist, coach and facilitator who is based in Johannesburg, South Africa, and specializes in working with individuals and teams around the world who are going through seasons of change, growth or challenge. She has a Masters degree in Critical Diversity Studies, and is passionate about social justice and helping individuals and teams achieve greater inner alignment, connection, equity and effectiveness. Jennie has 20 years of experience in the fields of Individual and Organizational Change, Leadership Development, Employee Engagement, Strategy and Values Alignment, and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Transformation. She is licensed in the use of individual and group coaching tools, including the Barrett Values Alignment Tool, the Enneagram, Gender Reconciliation International (GRI) process work and Organizational Relationship Systems Coaching (ORSC). She is accredited with Mentors and Business Coaches International (MBCI), an international network of mentors and coaches, and is one of the founding directors of the Kopanya Institute.
Advisors
David Rush
Dr David Rush is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, where he obtained his PhD in Fire Safety Engineering in 2013. His two main current research projects focus on fires in the informal settlements and slums of Cape Town (IRIS-Fire) and Nairobi (Tomorrow’s Cities), respectively. Using a combination of; quantitative and qualitative social surveys; state-of-the-art multi-scale experiments; computational fluid dynamics modelling; and unique and novel applications of existing satellite data and analysis, David and his team are developing tools and methods to understand and improve the resilience of these settlements to fire. David is a member of ISO/TC92/WG14 - Large outdoor fires and the built environment; was invited to give a keynote talk to the Institute of Fire Engineers Centenary Conference entitled, “Informal Settlement Fires: ‘Young people and fire; reducing risks and saving lives’”; and in 2018 received an EPSRC Recognising Inspiring Scientists and Engineers: Making Connections Award.
Guillermo Rein
Guillermo is Professor of Fire Science at the Department of Mechanical Engineering of Imperial College London and Editor-in-Chief of the journal Fire Technology. His research is centred on heat transfer, combustion and fire. The purpose of his work is to reduce the worldwide burden of accidental fires and protect people, their property, and the environment. His work has been recognised internationally with a number of research awards (e.g. 2018 SFPE Guise Medal, 2017 The Engineer Collaborate-to-Innovate Prize, 2017 Combustion Institute Sugden Award, 2016 SFPE Lund Award). He is a motivated teacher, enthusiastic about the education of the next generation of engineers, and passionate about engineering.
Reasat Faisal
Reasat is a passionate and seasoned development professional and Commonwealth Scholar with 9 years of work experience in international development at the national and international levels. He has a proven track record of successful program development, project design and management, research, fundraising, donor management, and strategic partnership development. Until September 2020, Reasat lead program development, resource mobilization, strategy, innovation and real-time data management teams of BRAC Urban Development Program in Dhaka, Bangladesh. He is currently a Doctoral Researcher in Economics focusing on Climate Change & Urban Migration at The University of Westminster. Reasat also has a BSc in Electrical Engineering and a MA in Urban Planning with a focus on urban resilience.
George Faller
George has significant experience in the design and supervision of structural and fire safety engineering projects. He joined Ove Arup in 1981 and worked as a structural engineer on a wide variety of projects in Africa, Europe and Asia until 1996. In 1997 he joined Arup Fire in London to pursue fire engineering and in 2002 he moved to Spain to set up a fire safety team. Since March 2019 George has been working with the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Dhaka, Bangladesh, as Chief Technical Advisor on the "Improving Working Conditions in the Ready-Made Garment Industry" programme.
Antonio Cicione
Dr Antonio Cicione is the Founder of CFS Engineering Consultants, a South African based multidisciplinary engineering firm. He has a PhD in Engineering from Stellenbosch University and he consults to industry regarding specialist fire engineer projects, performs rational fire designs and conducts fire investigations. Dr Cicione is a committee member of SAICE’s fire division. He has been involved in numerous fire experiments, and has burned down more that 70 full-scale houses for research. Dr Cicione has published a number of international journal and conference papers on a variety of fire and structural related papers.
John Twigg
John Twigg is an Honorary Professor at University College London, an independent researcher and consultant on disaster risk reduction, and a co-editor of the journal Disasters. His research interests include community-based approaches, extensive risks, early warning systems, socio-economic vulnerability to disasters, policy and institutional aspects of disaster management, post-disaster transitions and urban resilience.
Kaitlin Shilling
Kaitlin has spent her career creating impact. She builds on a broad skill set to develop innovative strategies that reach across industries and bridge diverse groups. Passionate about social entrepreneurship, rewarding partnerships; and innovative approaches to challenges in development. Experience in Indonesia, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Liberia, Haiti & Kyrgyzstan. Kaitlin established an online platform, PLUS, that connects social entrepreneurs to opportunities and helps them grow by offering business consultations. PLUS is the go-to resource for information on social entrepreneurs in Indonesia, and is the first to develop a publicly available directory of social enterprises across the country.
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