Methodological Resources for Investigating the Failure Status of Electrical Wiring with Copper Conductors as the Cause of Fire

The forensic task of establishing a causal relationship between the failure status of copper wiring and the moment of fire ignition is a pertinent one. Experts of the Russian Federal Centre of Forensic Science of the Russian Ministry of Justice routinely review the findings of initial investigations conducted by forensic science organizations of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations using methods and guidance materials that claim to help determine the time of fault initiation in electrical wiring (prior to or during the fire), and thus establish whether the fault status caused or contributed to fire ignition. The paper offers a critical review of methodological materials produced by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Emergency Situations for practitioners investigating this causal relationship, and exposes their inconsistencies and limitations that will need to be corrected in order to make these practitioner guides actually practicable.