Rusthi is the founding director of Passionate Fire with over 14 years of research, construction, and consultancy experience. He has worked collaboratively with various design teams to justify complex fire engineering problems in residential, aged care, sports complex, industrial, and mixed-use developments in Australia, New Zealand, and the United States of America. In these projects, he has developed holistic fire safety strategies and performance-based design solutions to address departures from the prescriptive requirements of the building codes. He utilises proven scientific methodologies in developing design solutions, including structural fire engineering design and analysis, fire dynamics simulations, and evacuation simulations. Through his technical and leadership skills, he engages with the stakeholders to offer practical and efficient fire safety engineering design, focusing on accomplishing design aspirations.Rusthi’s qualifications include a PhD from Australia, an MScEng from the USA, and a BScEng(Hons) from Sri Lanka in the fields of fire, civil, and structural engineering. He is a member of the Institute of Engineers Australia and Society of Fire Safety, a Chartered Professional Engineer and on the National Engineering Register of Engineers Australia, a Registered Professional Engineer in Victoria, and a Building Development Certifier in New South Wales.