Principal Fire Engineer & Founder

 

Max McCarthy CEng MIFireE MCABE MCIOB is the founder and Principal Fire Engineer at Clarity Fire Engineering. A Chartered Engineer and Member of the Institution of Fire Engineers, Max holds a first-class BSc in Fire Safety Engineering alongside a portfolio of professional qualifications including a PgCert in Building Surveying and a Diploma in Fire Engineering Design.

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Max founded Clarity with a clear vision — to deliver honest, expert fire safety consultancy without the complexity and opacity that too often surrounds the industry. His career spans high-rise residential, commercial, and healthcare estates, with specialist expertise in Fire Risk Appraisals of External Walls, forensic building pathology, expert witness work, and Building Regulations compliance assessment. Prior to establishing Clarity, Max held senior management roles within local authority building control — including managing a shared building control service across four local authorities with responsibility for complex cases and fire safety design, and leading a multidisciplinary team of building regulations engineers, structural engineers, and fire engineers within a prominent central London building control body. This direct experience of how building control decisions are made, recorded, and enforced gives Clarity a level of regulatory insight that is directly relevant to the complex legal and compliance disputes it is instructed on.

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Prior to founding Clarity, Max established three specialist fire engineering consultancies for other organisations — each focused on external wall safety and passive fire protection — demonstrating a consistent track record of building high-quality specialist practices in the sector.

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His academic background includes three years of doctoral research into fire behaviour at the University of Hertfordshire — research that directly informs the forensic, evidence-led approach Clarity brings to its most complex instructions. He is also an Engineering Council Registration panel assessor for CABE.

At Clarity, Max combines deep technical expertise with a direct, precise approach to every instruction — giving clients not just answers, but genuine clarity.