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Enhancing Commercial Aircraft Survivability Via Active Venting, Roger L. Veldman

Dissertations

A new technique for enhancing aircraft safety in the event of an on-board explosion was studied. The method under study employs deployable vent panels located on the fuselage which are activated by an array of pressure sensors in the aircraft interior. In the event that an explosion is detected, appropriate vent panels are rapidly released from the aircraft. This approach seeks to provide timely relief of explosive pressures within an aircraft to prevent catastrophic structural failure.

In this study, the approximate time scale of an explosive detonation and the subsequent sensing and electronic processing was determined. Then, the actuation response …