CFD model for safer skies

A project to improve the false alarm rate and to standardise the certification of fire detection systems in cargo compartments of commercial aircraft is underway with major participation by Sandia National Laboratories, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and NASA Glenn Research Center. Sandia's role in the project was to develop a physics-based Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model to analyse smoke transport in cargo compartments.

The FAA and other regulatory agencies throughout the world require that cargo compartments on passenger-carrying aircraft be equipped with fire detection systems. A false alarm for a cargo compartment detection systems is estimated to occur 100 times more frequently than an alarm due to an actual fire. This often results in emergency diversion landings that are costly and that may needlessly compromise the safety of the flight.

Current regulations require that the detection systems alarm within one minute of the start of a fire. Flight tests are required to certify detection systems and demonstrate compliance with these regulations. Due to the high costs of flight tests, extensive ground tests are typically conducted to ensure that the detection system will meet requirements during the flight tests.