When you see an airplane crash in the news, you expect to see a fiery explosion as evidence of impact; a mess of fire, smoke and debris. In what looks like an answer to this issue, an industrial chemist has developed an additive for fuel that could prevent jet airplanes from exploding and causing a fire on impact. His name is Ming-Hsin Wei, and he is a research scientist at California school of Technology, better known as Caltech. Wei and his team have developed a specific polymer strand that stops jet engines from igniting if the jet crashes.
Jet planes engines are constantly exploding!
So what exactly happens in a jet plane’s engine? Mini-explosions, just like any other engines, actually. Engines work by taking compressed air and the fuel. Once it comes together, it results in an explosion. In order to stop these explosions from happening, Wei thought to add the polymer strings in the fuel and as a result, the fuel stops mixing with the air, thus preventing an explosion. A polymer is a tiny filament that is made up of plastic. The specific one used by Wei’s team is called a megasupramolecule, and it mends together with other megasupramolecules to form progressive chains. The great thing about this polymer is that not a lot is needed for it to be affective. With .3% of this substance added into the fuel, its flammability would be reduced significantly. The only drawback to this discovery is that the polymer additive has a breaking point, but this only encourages the team to continue working on a polymer strand that is able to fix itself.
Fatalities in plane crashes
According to statistics, 500-1000 deaths occur in crashes every year due to airplane crash explosions. This development, if tested outside a lab, could significantly help to decrease the number of fatalities in the event of a crash.
The future of flying
Caltech scientists have been working on this polymer since 2002, and while they have not reached their desired results, Wei believes that they will get where they want to go within a year. When and if this happens, people will have one less thing to worry about during a plane crash, and citizens with a phobia of flying more will be able to gain more confidence as they sit in the airplane cabin.
