Terrorist Inerters Needed
Kirt's Cogitations™ #25

RF Cafe University "Factoids," "Kirt's Cogitations," and "Tech Topics Smorgasbord" are all manifestations of my ranting on various subjects relevant (usually) to the overall RF Cafe theme. All may be accessed on these pages:

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Terrorist Inerters Needed

A "breakthrough" discovery has been claimed by Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) investigators looking for a way to prevent fuel tank explosions. Onboard "inerting" systems have been tried in the past for reducing the likelihood of explosions, but the weight and expense of the voluminous nitrogen bottles needed to backfill fuel tanks made such a system impractical. The breakthrough came while experimenting with just how much, in terms of a ratio, nitrogen had to be present in the tanks to prevent an explosion. Surprisingly, an oxygen content of 12% or less is all that is required to virtually eliminate the possibility of an explosion. Since air is normally composed of 79% nitrogen, 20% oxygen and 1% traces gasses, the volume of backfill nitrogen is relatively small, making the systems much more practical. Details are being worked out, but in the near future the FAA will mandate inerting systems on all commercial airliners. Now, if we could just develop a practical "terrorist rocket inerter" (ala TWA Flight 800, in 1996)...

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RF Cafe began life in 1996 as "RF Tools" in an AOL screen name web space totaling 2 MB. Its primary purpose was to provide me with ready access to commonly needed formulas and reference material while performing my work as an RF system and circuit design engineer. The World Wide Web (Internet) was largely an unknown entity at the time and bandwidth was a scarce commodity. Dial-up modems blazed along at 14.4 kbps while tying up your telephone line, and a lady's voice announced "You've Got Mail" when a new message arrived...