Boeing developing fire suppressant artillery shells

Weird...

Not the theory, but the method of concept. I'm curious what kind of retardant would be so effective in such a small volume. Even the biggest shells we used weren't anything close to a Bambi bucket in weight much less a water tanker.


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Lawman said:
Weird...

Not the theory, but the method of concept. I'm curious what kind of retardant would be so effective in such a small volume. Even the biggest shells we used weren't anything close to a Bambi bucket in weight much less a water tanker.


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I wonder if there is much effect of an explosion "sucking the air out" of the area, boosting the effectiveness of the suppressant that remains? I was on the receiving end of a couple rounds that landed nearby, and it was hard to breathe for a bit until the smoke and heat from the round dissipated and the regular air flowed back in. Talking several seconds. Maybe that plus suppressant settling on things would work pretty well?
 
Beefy McGee said:
I wonder if there is much effect of an explosion "sucking the air out" of the area, boosting the effectiveness of the suppressant that remains? I was on the receiving end of a couple rounds that landed nearby, and it was hard to breathe for a bit until the smoke and heat from the round dissipated and the regular air flowed back in. Talking several seconds. Maybe that plus suppressant settling on things would work pretty well?
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I don't think oxygen depravation or over pressure principles is gonna do it. You'd need something very persistent to take the massive amount of heat in a forest fire to keep the O2 out to keep it from flaring right back up.

I could see you dispersing a good chunk of chemical retardant with something like a couple ATACM rockets, but artillery even off a battleship is only so big in volume. I mean even in explosive power 155s don't do much when compared to small bombs in the Mk80 series.


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If these do turn out to work at all, the Army needs to buy a bunch.

Stick 1 in ever battery fire x3 fire mission.... No more training time lost going down range and putting out the fire you knew you'd start. Hell it would let us multi task our training. I do diving rockets starting a fire on the range, then I do artillery call for fire putting it out.


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Have they ever dropped liquid nitrogen from an aircraft instead of retardant? The cooling effect and rapid expansion of the liquid nitrogen displacing oxygen should put out a fire. Is it too costly?
 
I sent this to a friend of mine who was an artillery guy, and he sent this back:

"More to think about is where would the canister (of retardant) go? I would assume that they will use a base-ejecting projectile. The canister would continue to travel on an unstable trajectory to an area that would have to be calculated and then most likely recovered."

I posited that maybe it was some sort of consumable or recycleable material? He came back with:

"I know comp b, phosphorous and the other rounds, we chuck 10+KM were all 95lb plus, otherwise the ballistic trajectory would suck.. not mention the way the actual propellant works to kick the pig that far.. I think anything else would melt…"
 
Looks like the application mentions a wide range of fuzing and guidance options. This suggests that they haven't figured out what works best, but that they want to cover their bases now before someone else covers them.

One of the options that the application mentions is GPS guidance. Boeing makes the JDAM. If they want to actually deliver more than 3 gallons of retardant they can just pack the fuzing and the retardant into a much larger container that they don't have to worry about blasting into the sky. The planes can spot the worst parts of the fires in real time and then air launch retardant packages with JDAM guidance. They can lay down a pattern of 6 around whatever structure they're trying to save with a 5 meter CEP with JDAM kits, and can probably use cheaper INS-only guidance on their area targets.

I guess what I'm saying is that Boeing might be "better known for making aircraft than for ammunition" but they usurped Raytheon long ago as king for precision guided free fall munitions. A domestic application of the technology would be awesome.
 
I could get behind this though.

"CalFire 20, Boom 6, adjust fire, over"
"Boom 6, CalFire 20 Adjust fire out"
"GRID12345678, Wildfire in the open, Suppressant in Effect, Over"
"Wildfire in the open, Suppressant in Effect, I authenticate Whiskey Tango, Over"
"I authenticate Foxtrot, out"
 
Flyinthrew said:
Looks like the application mentions a wide range of fuzing and guidance options. This suggests that they haven't figured out what works best, but that they want to cover their bases now before someone else covers them.

One of the options that the application mentions is GPS guidance. Boeing makes the JDAM. If they want to actually deliver more than 3 gallons of retardant they can just pack the fuzing and the retardant into a much larger container that they don't have to worry about blasting into the sky. The planes can spot the worst parts of the fires in real time and then air launch retardant packages with JDAM guidance. They can lay down a pattern of 6 around whatever structure they're trying to save with a 5 meter CEP with JDAM kits, and can probably use cheaper INS-only guidance on their area targets.

I guess what I'm saying is that Boeing might be "better known for making aircraft than for ammunition" but they usurped Raytheon long ago as king for precision guided free fall munitions. A domestic application of the technology would be awesome.
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I don't agree.

While JDAM is a great munition there are some serious drawbacks to it. We have outstanding usage of it due to our aircraft being built with the idea of avionics and telemetry sharing from the aircraft to the munition. Even still the munition flight geometry on a JDAM when compared to the Paveway family is really restrictive requiring the aircraft to do much more work for the weapon requiring more checks and skill on the pilot to insure they don't F that bomb away.

That's the main thing is see an issue with some sort of GPS guided anti fire munition. Unless the plane can physically talk to the weapon to give it that Last second INU telemetry the bomb has to do it on its own which eats a lot of battery power and requires time (therefor altitude). We ran into this issue with FMS programs to foreign partners.


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bimmerphile said:
2018: "Howitzer batteries to be installed around perimeter of the LA basin for fire defense"



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And could be rotated 180 degrees as necessary.

escape_from_la_poster_01.jpg




dustoff17 said:
If this can be proven in application, I look forward to the larger-scaled rounds and a B52 "carpet bombing" of a big fire.

I would absolutely pay to see that!!
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Big white Buffs with red tails...

0021296g1.jpg


Oh, it's a big pretty white plane with red stripes, curtains in the windows and wheels and it looks like a big Tylenol!
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b3181981 said:
Have they ever dropped liquid nitrogen from an aircraft instead of retardant? The cooling effect and rapid expansion of the liquid nitrogen displacing oxygen should put out a fire. Is it too costly?
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It would never reach the ground.



JacksonHandy said:
I could get behind this though.

"CalFire 20, Boom 6, adjust fire, over"
"Boom 6, CalFire 20 Adjust fire out"
"GRID12345678, Wildfire in the open, Suppressant in Effect, Over"
"Wildfire in the open, Suppressant in Effect, I authenticate Whiskey Tango, Over"
"I authenticate Foxtrot, out"
Click to expand...

"Shot. Over."
 
b3181981 said:
Have they ever dropped liquid nitrogen from an aircraft instead of retardant? The cooling effect and rapid expansion of the liquid nitrogen displacing oxygen should put out a fire. Is it too costly?
Click to expand...

Liquid nitrogen in the open doesn't work like that.

I used to have a chemistry professor that would demonstrate how safe liquid nitrogen was by throwing it/spilling it in the open near people. It gains thermal energy so fast that within moments of exiting a closed container it turns into a gas and is basically harmless,

Still great for closed system cooling though.
 
"Splash"
"On target, FIRE FOR EFFECT!!"

Oh, yeah.................!!!!!!!!

or would that be "Fire at the fire for effect"?
 
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