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ABSTRACT Accessibility between fire hydrants and buildings is paramount in emergency response, significantly influencing the efficiency and effectiveness of firefighting operations in the event of an incident. However, assessing this relationship within a geographic information system (GIS) framework presents challenges on two fronts. Obtaining the path avoiding building and parcel obstructions to hydrants is not trivial. Further, determining the furthest extent around a building exterior from hydrants is complicated, yet it is critically important given the spatial limitations of equipment reach. To assess furthest extent, an analytical framework is introduced based on the Euclidean shortest path problem. The proposed approach offers a comprehensive, automated GIS‐based methodology tailored to evaluate the dynamic relationship between hydrants and buildings. The developed methods are able to accurately and precisely identify the furthest point around a building structure from hydrant, facilitating risk assessment as well as fire code compliance. This enables a comprehensive evaluation of potential loss and structure vulnerability at property, street, neighborhood, and regional levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Steel-coped beams are used in industrial structures to accommodate a cluster of water mains, fire hydrants, power cables and telecommunication wires. The coped regions restrict the ultimate capacity and cause unfavorable failure modes. The current study investigates the structural assessment of the coped section in offshore topsides while their use enhances operational safety for drilling and production. The structural evaluation is done through 2D digital image correlation (DIC) experiments to quantify the influence of various cope geometries. The DIC technique illustrated the strain and deformation measurements under different loading conditions for different coped geometry. The primary failure mode observed in local web buckling is characterized by noticeable lateral displacement and the development of buckling lines over the coped web. Studies showed the influence of the cope depth on the load-carrying capacity and buckling processes for different cope geometries. The results of the DIC analysis are strongly aligned with experimental data and finite element numerical results, suggesting this technique to the structural assessment of coped section. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flushing is a widely used method for cleaning water pipes, demanding the achievement of optimal flushing velocity for effectiveness. A prior examination of flushing condition including velocity, duration, and flow rate is crucial to minimize water and economic losses while maximizing the impact of flushing. Although simulation models are commonly employed for this purpose, they often overlook potential head loss during flow through hydrants or drain valves, compromising the effectiveness of flushing. This study investigated the impact of different simulation methods on estimating flushing conditions through hydrants and drain valves. The structural layout (minor loss coefficient) and specifications (emitter coefficient) of each flushing path were incorporated into traditional models. Applying this method to a hypothetical network and the water distribution system of G-City in Gyeonggi Province of South Korea, we compared the flushing effects of four different modeling approaches. Results reveal that drain valves tend to exhibit higher velocity than hydrants under the same conditions, mainly due to their structural layout. However, both drain valves and hydrants may experience overestimation of flow rate and velocity if the minor loss coefficient is disregarded. Practitioners should exercise caution regarding potential low flushing efficiencies. The limited numbers and locations of drain valves compared to hydrants constrain their field application, emphasizing the need for comprehensive consideration of various field conditions when developing a suitable flushing plan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Advances in information technologies and vehicle automation have birthed new transportation services, including shared autonomous vehicles (SAVs). Shared autonomous vehicles are on-demand self-driving taxis, with flexible routes and schedules, able to replace personal vehicles for many trips in the near future. The siting and density of pick-up and drop-off (PUDO) points for SAVs, much like bus stops, can be key in planning SAV fleet operations, since PUDOs impact SAV demand, route choices, passenger wait times, and network congestion. Unlike traditional human-driven taxis and ride-hailing vehicles like Lyft and Uber, SAVs are unlikely to engage in quasi-legal procedures, like double parking or fire hydrant pick-ups. In congested settings, like central business districts (CBD) or airport curbs, SAVs and others will not be allowed to pick up and drop off passengers wherever they like. This paper uses an agent-based simulation to model the impact of different PUDO locations and densities in the Austin, Texas CBD, where land values are highest and curb spaces are coveted. In this paper 18 scenarios were tested, varying PUDO density, fleet size and fare price. The results show that for a given fare price and fleet size, PUDO spacing (e.g., one block vs. three blocks) has significant impact on ridership, vehicle-miles travelled, vehicle occupancy, and revenue. A good fleet size to serve the region's 80 core square miles is 4000 SAVs, charging a $1 fare per mile of travel distance, and with PUDOs spaced three blocks of distance apart from each other in the CBD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, fires on heavy vehicles and trucks still represent a severe threat to environment and people safety, with serious consequences and injuries. In this context, fire losses can be minimized by preventing the rapid onset of fire and allowing drivers and occupants to escape safely by implementing an effective fire monitoring and extinguishing system. Commercially available fire extinguishing systems have shown multiple lacks concerning the structural implementation of the system only on specific types of heavy vehicles, the monitoring of system parameters, and the environmental toxicity of the extinguishing agents employed. Therefore, the present article proposes the early design and development of a novel integrated fire monitoring and extinguishing system for trucks and heavy vehicles called 'T-Fire System'. The proposed solution can operate in any environment (confined and not) through a close interconnection between the onboard diagnostic sensors and the plug and play fire extinguishing system which employs environmentally sustainable fluorine-free extinguishing agent. The development of the T-Fire System has started from a patented prototype, and preliminary evaluations of both the monitoring and the fire extinguishing system have shown promptness and reliability. Further research will be focused on improving and customising the solution for the pre-industrialization phase of the system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The functional layout of fire safety equipment in technical spaces of ships is a time-consuming process. When designing a ship fire protection system, the designer must manually position each system component in such a way as to meet the requirements of regulations arising from the technical specification, various legal regulations of maritime conventions and classification societies of the vessel to be designed. Layout of fire hydrants assisted by a computer that is based on pre-defined criteria and various constraints could significantly support the designer in working easier and faster. This paper presents a prototype computer-aided design system that enables optimal placement of fire hydrants using the metaheuristic Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm. This algorithm was used in Rhinoceros 3D software with its Grasshopper plugin for visualizing the arrangement of fire safety equipment. Various solution arrangements compared with the fire hydrant placement in real ships are illustrated by a case study. Demonstrating how design work can be facilitated and what potential benefits can be achieved are presented as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Riwayat: Educational Journal of History & Humanities is the property of Riwayat: Educational Journal of History & Humanities and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Researchers and engineers employ machine learning (ML) tools to detect pipe bursts and prevent significant non-revenue water losses in water distribution systems (WDS). Nonetheless, many approaches developed so far consider a fixed number of sensors, which requires the ML model redevelopment and collection of sufficient data with the new sensor configuration for training. To overcome these issues, this study presents a novel approach based on Long Short-Term Memory neural networks (NNs) that leverages transfer learning to manage a varying number of sensors and retain good detection performance with limited training data. The proposed detection model first learns to reproduce the normal behavior of the system on a dataset obtained in burst-free conditions. The training process involves predicting flow and pressure one-time step ahead using historical data and time-related features as inputs. During testing, a post-prediction step flags potential bursts based on the comparison between the observations and model predictions using a time-varied error threshold. When adding new sensors, we implement transfer learning by replicating the weights of existing channels and then fine-tune the augmented NN. We evaluate the robustness of the methodology on simulated fire hydrant bursts and real-bursts in 10 district metered areas (DMAs) of the UK. For real bursts, we perform a sensitivity analysis to understand the impact of data resolution and error threshold on burst detection performance. The results obtained demonstrate that this ML-based methodology can achieve Precision of up to 98.1% in real-life settings and can identify bursts, even in data scarce conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Tecnología y Ciencias del Agua is the property of Instituto Mexicano de Tecnologia del Agua (IMTA) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

A method of in‐situ leakage diagnosis of a water supply network using fire hydrant water flow measurements and simulation by EPANET software was established. A network with 1032 m of water distribution pipes and 350 user‐side water meters in Taipei was separated into five zones. The lowest volume of daily water flow occurred between 1:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m., with values ranging from 0.004 to 0.785 m3/min; these data can be regarded as a minimum value of water leakage in the network at midnight. The volume of water leakage was strongly correlated with observed pressure transients, enabling the measurement of the water leakage in the network, which ranged from 5.76 to 628 m3/d. The total water leakage simulated by EPANET was 1.48×103 m3/d in the network. Although this value deviated by 23% from the District Metered Area (DMA) results, both EPANET and DMA tools confirmed that zones 4 and 5 had severe water leakage problems. Simplifying valves and combining neighboring pipes of the same diameter during the EPANET simulation was efficiently tackle water leakage. EPANET allows for quick diagnosis of the water leakage areas, whereas the DMA tool allows for precise measurements of water volume and pressure. The costs of in‐situ diagnosis and EPANET simulation include instruments, labor, and time, and are estimated to be lower than those of the DMA tool. Furthermore, the methodology of this study can reduce the risks of underground working disasters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The object of research is the phenomenon of influence of hidden defects on the mechanical properties of the material of flexible pipelines. T-type pressure fire hoses with an inner diameter of 77 mm were used as test samples of flexible pipelines. During the operation of pressurized fire hydrants and their laying on vertical surfaces, they are subjected to significant bursting pressures in their longitudinal direction. That is, such operating modes of the sleeve may occur during its operation. The research was carried out on the FP 100/1 bursting machine, in which the test samples were fixed. The dependence of the stiffness and normal elasticity of the material of the flexible pipeline on the depth and length of the artificial defect when testing it for breaking has been established. With an artificial defect depth of 0.2 mm and its length from 0 to 40 mm, the stiffness of the flexible pipeline material decreases from 573.812 kN/m to 478.276 kN/m. With the indicated values of the defect, the normal elasticity ranged from 86.46 MPa to 64.567 MPa. When the depth of the defect increases by 0.4 mm, the stiffness of the sleeve material decreases to 432.902 kN/m, and the normal elasticity decreases to 58.442 MPa. The obtained results are explained by the fact that when the thickness of the threads of the base of the power frame is reduced by 33 %, the longitudinal stiffness and normal elasticity of the material of the flexible pipeline are reduced by 25 % and 26 %, respectively. The results of these studies are needed in practice because they can make it possible to develop new or improve existing methods of detecting hidden defects in the material from which flexible pipelines are made. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire safety is one of the major concerns in the public transport and thus passenger trains in the UK seek continuous improvement in passenger safety and comfort. In order to combat fire, there is a legal requirement in most countries across the global to install a fire suppression system within passenger railroad cars. In the event of fire, the thermal sensors trigger high pressure flow of hydrant through nozzles into the railroad car, thus supressing the fire. The efficient design of fire suppression system is highly dependent on the operational parameters of the system. The published literature, although abundant in investigating the flow characteristics through nozzles, severely lacks in conjugating this with fire suppression. Thus, in the present study, extensive parametric investigations have been carried out on the operational and design parameters of a conventional fire suppression system using an integrated approach i.e., hydrant flow and combustion. Advanced numerical techniques have been employed to evaluate the hydrodynamic characteristics of the fire suppression system based on the size of droplets of the hydrant from exiting the nozzles and the flow rate of the hydrant. The effects of these parameters on the temperature and the concentration of soot particles within the passenger railroad car have been evaluated. The results show that smaller sized hydrant droplets (250um) are more effective in supressing the fire in enclosures compared to larger droplets (750um), while higher flow rates tend to supress the fire more efficiently. It is envisaged that the results obtained in the present study will help in developing more efficient fire suppression systems for passenger railroad cars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Key Takeaways: The Public Protection Classification (PPC) is used as an input in determining home insurance cost, and the available fire flow is an important input in determining the PPC. To determine a water system's available fire flow, either hydrant flow tests or hydraulic modeling can be used to calculate water main capacity. Each method has its pros and cons, and familiarity with each enables the engineer to select the best approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the validity of using fluid transients as a rapid screening tool to augment existing methods for assessing the condition of buried water systems. In particular, the paper provides one of the first detailed investigations on the impact of pipe wall deterioration on the characteristic of transient waves in both laboratory and field experiments. Laboratory pipeline sections were deteriorated by an accelerated corrosion process using controlled electrolytic cell reactions, and three cases were considered: where corrosion is limited to the internal wall, limited to the external wall, and where both internal and external walls are corroded. Hydraulic transient tests were carried out to measure the transient wave speed in these corroded pipe sections, and the measurements are found to be consistent with the theoretical predictions using the observed wall thickness loss, confirming that wave speed can be used as an indicator of pipe wall deterioration. Field experiments were carried out in the water supply network in the Waimakariri District, New Zealand, to validate the performance of this pipe condition diagnostic methodology. Transient tests were conducted on selected 60-year-old sections of asbestos cement (AC) pipelines and sensors were connected to standard fire hydrants to measure the wave speeds and wave reflections. Compared with the theoretical calculated wave speed of intact pipelines, a 140–300 m/s wave speed decrease was observed in most of the tested sections which is in line with the expectation for pipelines of this age. The wave speeds were used to predict the in-situ thickness of the pipe wall and these predictions were found to match with computed tomography X-ray scan results of the excavated pipe with good accuracy. The same methodology was also used to correctly detect an unrecorded plastic pipe section in the AC pipe network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The fulfilment of the emergency response to the disaster area not only prioritises foods or medicines but also helps in mobilisation of equipment, facilities, and infrastructures in the form of logistics. The suitable warehouses will be able to provide every logistic needed and this will have a positive impact on the government as one of the relief institutions that is responsible for helping the refugees as quickly as possible. Objectives: The objectives of the study are to determine the logistic needs from disaster area, analyse and evaluate all assets from the 35 warehouses, identify the key indicators to generate the parameter, and to generate several mathematical formulas to be used in the simulation case. Method: Euclidean-based methodology is applied to calculate every fitness distance as a gap value of each parameter. All stock quantity from 35 warehouses will be the source of the data, with the logistic needs play role as the initial input for the calculation processes. Results: The logistic needs and the distance resulted in this study became the key indicators to determine the criteria. The study also generates seven equations for the disaster's case simulation. Conclusion: To conclude, the outcomes resulted from the simulation indicate that from 35 warehouses alternatives, the fitness gap calculation completed at the 31st warehouse and the public hydrant became the fastest logistic, which completed all demand by two warehouses. Contribution: The study will be useful for the decision makers as the recommendation and guideline to improve the acceleration of emergency response of the logistic mobilisation from selected and prioritised warehouses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, COPAM (Classified Characteristic Curves Model) computer software was used to analyze the performance of the Burdur Çavdır Küçükalan pressurized irrigation system. With the help of COPAM, analyses such as flow rate - water source elevation, detection of hydrants insufficient in terms of relative pressure, hydrant dependability, the sufficiency of hydrants at different water source elevations, re-calculation of pipe diameters in current conditions, comparison of old and new cost of the irrigation system according to calculated pipe diameters were made. At the end of the study, it was determined that the irrigation system could work with an efficiency of 90 % under current conditions. In the study, it was also determined that 2 of the 42 hydrants in the system were insufficient in terms of relative pressure and their reliability values were -0-. In the evaluation made in terms of pipe diameters under current conditions, it was determined that while smaller diameter pipes should be used in 26 pipelines (6 818.50 m), larger diameter pipes should be used in 2 pipelines (491.40 m). In the case of using pipe diameters calculated with COPAM, hydrants numbers with relative pressure deficiency decreased to 1. In the cost analysis, it was determined that if the pipe diameters determined by the COPAM are used, 57 262.49 $ can be saved from the project cost. As a result, it has been concluded that the COPAM can be used in the performance analysis of pressurized irrigation systems. If COPAM or similar programs are used, it will be possible to increase the efficiency of the projects by reducing their investment costs. For this reason, it is thought that COPAM or similar programs should be used by relevant institutions for the evaluation of pressurized irrigation systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents a Regret-based optimization model for multi-period consequence management of contaminations entering the WDNs considering the pollutants loads' entry uncertainties. For this purpose, first, the EPANET software is utilized as a water quality-quantity simulation modeling tool. Then, an optimization model based on a genetic algorithm using the primary objective functions of minimizing the return time of the contaminated WDNs to the normal mode, the amount of pollution, and the number of polluted nodes. Besides, the pollutant load-related uncertainties are included in the presented simulation-optimization model by minimizing the maximum Regret (MMR) and the total Regret (MTR) in two steady and dynamic status for all three mentioned objective functions. Using these nine objective functions, three management instruments are utilized: quick closing valves, discharging hydrants, and boosting pumps. The results show that the proposed model can effectively prevent harmful pollution by offering effective management strategies, mainly in dynamic status scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, on-demand irrigation systems have been promoted to increase water use efficiency. This study focused on the assessment of two traditional rotational pressurized irrigation systems with a central pumping station in the Foggia Province (Italy). Irrigation system A has an area of 564 ha with 319 pipelines and 251 hydrants, and irrigation system B has an area of 445 ha with 280 pipelines and 214 hydrants. The nominal discharge of each hydrant is 10 l/s. In each of the two irrigation systems, 1000 different operation scenarios were investigated using the COPAM model. To evaluate the performance of the systems, the indices of Relative Pressure Deficit (RPD) and Reliability (RI) were used. Results showed that the systems are quite flexible and allow the required flow rate to be increased by 1.6 times the peak period flow rate, if necessary. With such increased discharges, it is impossible to guarantee the RPD ( R P D ≥ 0 ) and RI (RI = 1) indices in 47% of the hydrants in the irrigation system A and in 36.9% of the hydrants in the irrigation system B. An updated methodology for optimizing the pipe diameters starting from the current situation was also implemented. Around 23% of pipelines in each system were changed with such methodology. After the new optimization, the number of unsatisfied hydrants in both systems decreased by 94.1% (from 118 to 7 hydrants) and 82.3% (from 79 to 14 hydrants), respectively. Thus, with this methodology, the irrigation system performance can be improved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a pilot study for the diagnosis through transient tests of the water distribution systems of Milan, Italy, hydrants were used for both pressure measurement and pressure wave generation. In the field tests, the maneuver of the hydrant valve used for the pressure wave generation led to an increase in the measured pressures due to the trapping of the pressure waves inside the hydrant connection. In this paper, the trapping phenomenon was analyzed in time and frequency domains to evaluate analytically the effects of the connection geometric characteristics on the pressure variations. The results of field and laboratory tests are shown to confirm the theoretical considerations and extend the investigation to viscoelastic pipes. Because the same phenomenon can also take place in user connections, which present a similar combination of pipe impedance and geometry, the similarity of hydrant and user connections in terms of the response to transients was also explored. Results of the case study and their interpretation can be relevant for the diagnosis of water distribution systems through transient tests and for the design of hydrants and user connections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focusses on real-time detection and abnormal state prediction through a set of wireless equipment of fire water system to provide a better solution for fire inspection. The main goal of this research is to improve the fire extinguishing efficiency. Firefighting and rescue operations are urgent, and concealed or dry fire hydrants may cause failure cases of firefighting. To prevent this situation, this paper proposed the wireless equipment of fire water system to monitor the multiple indicators of outdoor hydrant, indoor hydrant, and sprinkler network. The objective of the experiment is to realize the real-time monitoring and obtain the data information of the state of the fire water system. Also, the multiple linear regression analysis method is adopted to analyze the monitored water pressure data to achieve rapid identification of abnormal water pressure value. The results indicate that the data transmission of the wireless equipment of fire water system is reliable, the pressure is accurately monitored below 0.40 MPa, and the average relative error of abnormal water pressure monitoring results is less than 6%. The new equipment and algorithm are used not only to monitor the state of water supply system, but also to depict the change of water consumption in the monitoring environment and predict the unconventional state, which provides directional help for fire patrol and inspection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the results of a pilot study funded by Metropolitana Milanese to investigate the use of transient tests for the diagnosis of the water distribution network of Milan (Italy). The peculiar aspects of the application of transient-based techniques to a complex system in an urban environment are discussed. Synchronous pressure signals acquired at 2,048 and 1,000 Hz at different measurement sections are shown and analyzed by auto- and cross-correlation, and wavelet transform. The effects of the shape of the pressure wave introduced in the system by the manoeuvre of a valve and the effects of repetition of the same manoeuvre on the reliability of the results are discussed. The main practical lessons learned about the use of hydrants, the topological and effective distances of measurement sections, the need for the introduction of pressure waves of given shapes, the information carried by the pressure signals for the diagnosis, and the use of simplified wavelet analysis are also presented and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There have been several water main breaks attributed to fire hydrant operations despite the persistent guidance from stakeholders to operate the hydrants "slowly." Traditional water hammer simulations for determining the safe operational times for every hydrant can be tedious and impractical for most water utilities. While the rapid operation of certain hydrants can generate excessive pressures, most hydrants are benign and do not generate pressures capable of bursting water mains. Using certain simplified water hammer parameters, the authors propose automated methods that can identify benign hydrants at least 100 times faster than the traditional methods where the operation of each hydrant is simulated by manually modifying the baseline models. Detailed analysis with more accurate data can then be performed to determine the precise operational times for the critical hydrants and develop the necessary measures to safeguard their operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The real-time control of water distribution networks for firefighting is an important but little-studied problem. Water utilities in England and Wales reduce hydraulic pressure to a minimum regulatory threshold in order to reduce leakage and avoid financial penalties. However, utilities are not legally bound to guarantee specific flow rates from fire hydrants, which poses a risk for firefighting. This study presents an adaptive nonlinear model predictive control scheme for water distribution networks integrating two modes of control: (1) normal control, when a network operates under normal conditions and the objective is to minimize energy costs and average zonal pressure, and (2) fire control, when fire flows need to be delivered from hydrants without exceeding maximum pressure and customer demand is maintained to the best extent possible. The proposed scheme is applied to an operational network. It demonstrates the combined benefits of reducing costs and leakage with increased fire flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents the results of research on water losses from the pipe network of irrigation plots still in the exploitation phase in Romania. These plotters have a long service life, considering their creation about 40-50 years ago. The advanced degree of wear and tear of network components, especially pipes and hydrants, led to the occurrence and maintenance of water losses. The assessment of water losses is done directly on site by measurements on the pipe network. The simulation of water losses is carried out by using appropriate calculation programs in this field (Epanet and its extensions, Hydra, AutoCad, ArcMap), with the use of databases created in Excel and Word. The simulation requires a complex data base collected from the field, from the design documentation and from the network operation process. The input data required in the analysis program are represented by sets of word, excel, .xl and .dxf files and so on. The results obtained by simulation are exported in tables, graphs, curves of variation of hydraulic parameters and other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]