Full time fire and explosion investigator, analyst, researcher and author, and court qualified expert witness.Richard Meier has investigated fires and explosions from Miami Beach, Florida to the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii. He has been involved in such high profile cases as the 2012 fatal high-rise fire in Chicago (the woman in the elevator); the 2012 explosion and fire at JJ's Restaurant in Kansas City; the infamous 2013 explosion of the West Fertilizer Company in West, Texas; and the multi-fatality 2017 Marco Polo high-rise fire in Honolulu. In all of his cases Mr. Meier brings to bear not only his training and experience as a fire investigator, but also his training and experience as a design and manufacturing engineer. Finding the cause of a fire or an explosion requires not only an understanding of fire, but an understanding of how all the components contributing to a fire work together to create the event. It also requires knowing how everything works, and more importantly, how things fail. This is the kind of knowledge that is only acquired over decades of designing, building, troubleshooting and fixing a multitude of products. It is that knowledge that puts him well ahead of the competition.Mr. Meier performs Origin and Cause Investigations; Evidence Collection, Documentation and Preservation; Evidence Inspections and Examinations; Witness Interviews; Complex Analysis; Standards and Codes Research; Flammability, Laboratory and Product Testing; Litigation Support; testifies as an Expert Witness; and conducts Research into Topics of Interest to the Fire Investigation Community. He is knowledgeable in Fire Prevention, Protection and Suppression; Firefighter procedures; the Insurance industry; Large Loss Cases; Vehicles, Vessels, and Heavy Equipment; Labels, Warnings, and Instructions; Civil and Criminal Law as it concerns Fire Investigation; and Rules of Evidence for Criminal and Civil Court Proceedings.