Numerical model of aerial drop characteristic of mass firefighting units for aerial firefighting

The aerial drop characteristic of mass firefighting units has a significant influence on the effectiveness of aerial firefighting. In order to accurately describe the aerial drop characteristic of mass firefighting units, a numerical model covering the fundamental stages of the whole operation process was developed in the present study. In the model, mass firefighting units' filling and discharging processes are simulated by the discrete element method; the falling process is simulated by aerodynamic analysis, and the ground pattern characteristics are obtained. The model validation shows that, the numerical result agrees well with the experimental result with a maximum deviation of 14 %. The initial velocity distribution characteristic remains constant with varying filling amounts, and the mass fire firefighting units' initial velocities at different times follow a special normal distribution; the standard deviation of the initial velocities’ distribution primarily determines the width of mass firefighting units' ground pattern, while initial velocity and filling amount primarily determine the length of the ground pattern; the maximum coverage level is about 10 L/m².