Analysis of airflow around Sapran Nak Airfield using meteorological balloon system and computational fluid dynamics program

Abstract

This study was conducted to characterize air flow over the study areas through simulation using a commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software, ANSYS Fluent 15.0 and validating them with the actual air measurements using a meteorological balloon system. The study has found that the appropriate setting for upstream aerodynamic surface roughness (z0) was at 0.5 m (90% accuracy) for the sunflower vegetated area and at 0.1 m (85% accuracy) for the area on the mountain covered with small plants and sparse trees. The study, has also demonstrated that the use of CFD and a meteorological balloon system could improve operational parameterizations of z0, suggesting that they are applicable for use to carry out full scale atmosphere-surface simulation models for characterizing air flow over a mountain and nearby areas. Additionally, the use of CFD predicted values were also discussed in identifying unsafe areas for maneuvering helicopters.