Air Transport

An Airbus-led team of European companies is hoping an environmentally friendly design of fire-extinguishing system for engines and auxiliary power units (APU) will be cleared for use on airliners before the end of the decade, writes Max Kingsley-Jones.

The extinguishing agent in existing systems is halon, the production and use of which is banned by the 1994 Montreal protocol because it depletes the ozone layer and is a great contributor to greenhouse gases.

Under the Ecolog (Extinguishing Concept Lowering Ozone depletion and Greenhouse effect) research project, Airbus teamed with two partners to develop a replacement engine and APU fire-extinguishing system: Siemens subsidiary SAS, which specialises in on-board fire safety; and PyroAlliance, which is a division of France’s SNPE.

A new environmentally friendly agent has been developed, as well as a new extinguisher design.

The new extinguisher, designed and manufactured by Siemens SAS, was successfully tested last year, after which it was presented to the European Aviation Safety Agency and the US Federal Aviation Administration.

On the request of Airbus, the FAA is undertaking its own test campaign, which started last month. The final results are expected by July, and if the results are satisfactory, Siemens says that the new extinguisher system could be in service by 2008-9, enabling the system to be fitted as standard to the Airbus A350.

One of Airbus’s objectives is to eventually replace all the current systems that use halon, so the new concept will be evaluated for cargo compartment fire extinguishing.