Characterization of Ballistic Impact Flashes for Survivability Analyses Based on Empirical Models

摘要

Fires onboard aircraft are leading mechanisms for mishaps and losses during peacetime and combat operations. Typical ignition sources causing fires onboard aircraft include electrical sparks and hot surfaces. However, impact and penetration of common threats encountered during combat operations, such as armor piercing incendiary projectiles and missile fragments, generate short-lived, but thermally-intense clouds (flashes) capable of igniting fires. Fire simulations supporting system-level survivability analyses depend on accurate characterization of these flash clouds. Researchers at the Air Force Institute of Technology are developing statistically-based empirical models that describe time-dependent flash cloud geometries given impact conditions. This research presents the operational modeling approach used to develop the deterministic boundary model representation of impact flashes and the overall approach coupling physics-based energy models with empirical-based boundary models to realize a simulation-based approach to the characterization of ballistic impact flashes. Potential use of these combined models in survivability simulations is also discussed.