Abstract
This study examines the spread of a natural fire over an inclinable bench for several vegetative fuel-load and slope conditions and on an intermediate scale (18 m2). A pioneering combination of heat flux measurements and a large-scale particle image velocimetry system is presented. Three different fuel loads and two slopes (0° and 30°) are investigated. The results provide new insights into the fluid mechanics of fire spread, elucidating the air entrained flow motion generated by the fire as a function of the fuel load and slope in particular. For horizontal fires, increases in the vertical velocities and the size of the mixing layer, which is formed by the elevation of hot gases in the atmosphere, are observed with increasing fuel load. The air ahead of the fire is aspired far from the fire, suggesting convective cooling of the unburned vegetation. For 30°-upslope fires, the measurements show a convective heat transfer generated by hot gases advancing towards the unburned vegetation, which is supported by the elongation of the fire head. The experimental technique presented in this study is, therefore, effective for extracting valuable data for fire modeling.
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