Experimental Investigation of Aluminum Foam Lined Suppressive Shield Containment Vessels

Abstract

Manufacture, transport, and storage of dangerous goods, especially energetic materials, in Canada and around the world pose serious challenges to explosives regulators and inspectors. Currently siting of manufacturing and storage facilities are in accordance with quantity-distance principles designed to mitigate effects of accidental explosions. The land requirements to satisfy these principles are imposing financial burdens on the explosives sector. This paper presents an experimental program designed to investigate the effectiveness of suppressive shield containers in reducing the blast pressure outside of the container while eliminating fragments thus reducing the distance requirement for the stored amount of explosives. Several suppressive shield panels including aluminium foam-lined panels were tested to study their effect on blast pressure and impulse. In addition computational fluid dynamics techniques were used to study suppressive shields effects on blast environment. The results show reduction of the incident peak blast pressure by 60% and the incident impulse by 58%. The aluminium foam-lined suppressive shield panels attenuated the peak incident pressure and impulse by 80%.