Title: Fire Safety in Space – Flammability Experiments on the Cygnus Spacecraft
Speaker: Dr. Grunde Jomaas

From: University of Technology, Danmark
Date: Feb.26, 2013
Abstract:

Fire testing on an appropriate scale has never been carried out for manned spacecraft due to the complexity, cost and risk associated with operating a long duration fire safety experiment of a relevant size in microgravity. Therefore, there is currently a gap in knowledge of fire behavior in spacecraft. The entire body of low-gravity fire research has either been conducted in short duration ground-based microgravity facilities or has been limited to very small fuel samples. Still, the work conducted to date has shown that fire behavior in low-gravity is very different from that in normal-gravity, with differences observed for flammability limits, ignition delay, flame spread behavior and flame structure. As a result, the prediction of the behavior of fires in reduced gravity is at present not validated.
To address this gap in knowledge, a collaborative international project, Spacecraft Fire Safety (SFS), has been established with its cornerstone being the development of an experimental series to be conducted in the Orbital Cygnus ISS resupply vehicle after it leaves the ISS and before it re-enters the atmosphere. The experiment is being developed by an international topical team that is collaboratively defining the experiment requirements and performing supporting analysis, experimentation and technology development.