Blast waves and fireballs from bursts of vessels with pressure-liquefied hydrocarbons
✍ Scribed by G.M. Makhviladze; S.E. Yakush
- Publisher
- Elsevier Science
- Year
- 2002
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 379 KB
- Volume
- 29
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 1540-7489
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
Accidents including release of pressure-liquefied hydrocarbons into the atmosphere and their combustion are among the major hazards in the modern industry. A mathematical model for expansion of a volume of superheated liquid is developed and applied to predict the shock waves generated by bursts of highpressure vessels, as well as to calculate the concentration distributions and turbulent characteristics of the fuel/air clouds building up in the atmosphere after total loss of containment. Calculations are performed for bursts of vessels filled with pressure-liquefied propane; the overpressures are compared with those from high explosives and high-pressure vessels with air. The calculated distributions are used to pose initial conditions for the axisymmetric model for fireball evolution following ignition of the cloud. Fireballs from releases of 2000 kg of butane are studied. The numerical results are shown to correlate quite well with the integral characteristics of the fireball reported in the literature. Comparison of fireball dynamics, structure, and burning time is performed for the cases of total loss of containment and partial vessel failure leading to short-duration vertical fuel release. It is shown that total loss of containment leads to fireballs burning near the ground over a relatively shorter time, while vertical fuel releases result in fireballs burning slower and at larger elevations.