Towards the Development of a Specification for a Portable Fine Water Mist Fire Extinguisher for Spacecraft Applications

Prior work has revealed the unique aspects of re suppression in reduced gravity and presented the results of trade studies for both the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV ) and lunar landers. The trade studies for both of these spacecraft showed that ne water mist (FWM) systems are the best solution; extremely e ective, non-toxic, easy clean-up and minimal interference with spacecraft life support systems. More recent work has shown the initial characterization of a prototype potential FWM system as well as its performance in extinguishing prototype res. There exists, however, no standardized design or testing protocol for spacecraft re suppression systems (either handheld or total ooding designs), let alone a speci cation for a FWM system. While an extinguisher’s e cacy in safely suppressing any reasonable or conceivable re is the primary benchmark, it is not the only performance metric. There exist a range of criteria related to safety and reliability that must be met by any portable extinguisher. In this paper, we present the important performance speci cations of FWM systems with data from prototype and commercial systems as exemplars.