Former NASA Engineers Create Ingenious Way To Save Homes From Wildfires Using Noise (nypost.com) 67
"Scientists have created a miraculous new way to stop fires from spreading through neighborhoods using nothing but sound," reports the New York Post:
Former NASA engineers with California-based Sonic Fire Tech found that using sound waves can snuff out blazes and potentially be used to stop another Pacific Palisades inferno... The technology works by targeting oxygen molecules using low-frequency sound waves that vibrate them, stopping the fire from growing. "Sound waves vibrate the oxygen faster than the fuel can use it, and break the chemical reaction of the flame," Remington Hotchkis, Chief Commercialization Officer at Sonic Fire Tech told The Post.
The San Bernardino County Fire Department recently tested out the equipment using a backpack version and the results were incredible. Video shows firefighters fighting small blazes on a shrub and a stove top fire with the technology putting it out... In the home application, the system would be alerted/activated if there was a fire, sending the sound waves through a home duct system, essentially snuffing out the blaze. The sound waves can reach as far as 30ft from a home, the report noted. The sound is also harmless to pets and humans.
The article includes this quote that an executive at the company gave local news station KMPH. "Our former NASA engineers are rocket scientists, and they say it seems like magic, but it's just physics."
The San Bernardino County Fire Department recently tested out the equipment using a backpack version and the results were incredible. Video shows firefighters fighting small blazes on a shrub and a stove top fire with the technology putting it out... In the home application, the system would be alerted/activated if there was a fire, sending the sound waves through a home duct system, essentially snuffing out the blaze. The sound waves can reach as far as 30ft from a home, the report noted. The sound is also harmless to pets and humans.
The article includes this quote that an executive at the company gave local news station KMPH. "Our former NASA engineers are rocket scientists, and they say it seems like magic, but it's just physics."
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... more proof that Kubrick and Aldrin faked the moon landing.
Using it to fight fires in space might become a good application of this. I remember experimenting with 100 watts of 100Hz at about meter made it difficult to breath, however that was easy to hear.
"The sound is also harmless to pets and humans" (Score:4, Funny)
good luck convincing all the anti wind farm people about that and they won't be the only ones won't believe it
The sound of silence. (Score:2)
good luck convincing all the anti wind farm people about that and they won't be the only ones won't believe it
Uh, if your fire suppression system is going off often enough to disrupt wildlife patterns, you probably don’t have much actual wildlife left to worry about.
Re: "The sound is also harmless to pets and humans (Score:2)
That is what I like about American units (Score:1)
a) they sound so impressive, after all they are not called American units but Imperial units. That is cool!
b) they are impressive in a gigantic way: even the tiny things sound so big!
The sound waves can reach as far as 30ft from a home, the report noted.
So if a hapless bird flies trough flaming tree, the sonic wave will blow of the flames from his feathers, before it crash lands on your balcony?
Convert it into a useable unit, for example yards. Then you realize: this is ten steps, or five passes. If the fla
Re: That is what I like about American units (Score:4, Informative)
Why would a bird fly thru a burning tree?
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That's no bird! It's Superman!
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Because it wants to escape the fire and the wind pushes it through it?
Anyway, it was metaphorical speak.
30 feet is nothing. Wind turns a bit and fire 20 yards away jumps over 30 feet in an instance.
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Why would a bird fly thru a burning tree?
To save his collection of Birdman comics.
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Lots of wildfire research has confirmed the the cause of fires spreading is embers landing next to houses.
Standard wildfire prevention measures emphasize that the most important defense is to clear all burnable material from the first 5 feet ( 1.5 meters) from the house.
You don't need to defend any further distance. Just 1.5 meters.
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All units are arbitrary. Kilometers were supposed to be 1/10,000 of the distance between the equator to the earth's poles. Only problem is, that distance isn't the same in all places. And what's so special about 1/10,000 of that distance? Nothing. It's no less arbitrary than a yard being the length of some king's reach.
And to make it worse, the metric system isn't consistent. For example, it accepts the 24-hour day, the 60-minute hour, and the 60-second minute. Why didn't they break up the day into decimal
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And why don't we have 13 months of 28 days? 365/13 is 28.076923077 and 13 * 076923077 = 1.000000001. We could call this extra day a free day or something and it would fall between the first and last month of the year. Makes a lot more sense then the bullshit calendar we use now.
According to a quick DDG search and use of it's AI, Here's the answer on our current calendar.
The Gregorian calendar, which is the calendar used today, was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582, making it about 444 years old as of
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In addition to the divisibility by 12 or 13, the word "month" literally comes from "moon" referring to the lunar cycle. A month is supposed to occur once for every revolution of the moon around the earth, which is actually 27.3 days. So the month doesn't even stay true to its original definition.
The reality is, ancient people were not very precise with their numbers. Ancient texts generally use numbers more for their symbolism than for their precision. There's a lot of history behind why all the units we us
Build fireproof structures, this is not difficult. (Score:1)
It's quite practical to build completely fireproof homes. Some Californians do, which proves the rest can do that too. None of these things are difficult. Concrete domes shrug off embers. So do eaveless steel buildings which make ideal garages easy to erect with a very small crew (which I did). Both are easy to make quake-resistant.
Of course it's CA and art is more important than public safety so they'll continue to burn and I'll continue to scorn their silly choices.
There is nothing new to invent, only cho
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Even with a layer of stucco a wooden inner wall won't get to a temperature to spontaneously combust if you don't do something silly like planting eucalyptus next to it.
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I think it's the roof shingles that tend to catch first. We could make all those into nonflammable materials as well. Mandatory fire suppressant systems helps too. Who knows how expensive we can make this perfect house. Should probably add mandatory solar+battery on all new construction. In fact, let's also require water catchment and cistern storage.
It's not that all of that isn't a great idea but you've just raised the house by quite a bit of money and last I checked, your Average Westerner can't afford t
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Re: Build fireproof structures, this is not diffic (Score:2)
Re: Build fireproof structures, this is not diffic (Score:2)
Concrete domes shrug off embers. So do eaveless steel buildings
So all they need to do is simply replace every structure in California with concrete domes or eavesless steel buildings?
Wow, that shouldn't be a problem - thanks for such a simple answer! /smh
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Building open eave buildings in wildfire country is so silly, Americans and Australians love their ventilated roofs to death.
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Standard US building codes now specify screening of vents under eaves. This prevents embers from entering and starting a fire. That's what my houses have.
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Still makes it nearly impossible to completely protect the wood structure.
If you make the roof unventilated you could put mineral wool continuous exterior insulation everywhere including across and under the eaves and make it pretty much impossible for fire to get to the inner wood structure even if the gutters are full of burning leaves.
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Standard wildfire protection measures emphasize that you need to remove all burnable material within 5 feet (1.5 meters) of the house.
That's all you need to do.
If an ember lands in this zone, it will just burn out and not set the house on fire.
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Do you honestly believe that? That no embers will distribute more than 1.5 metres?
And "That's all you need to do"? Have you never seen a firestorm? Fires jumping long gaps driven by ferocious winds?
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Only embers which land within 5 feet of the house are a danger. If that area is clear of flammable material the house is safe.
Re:Build fireproof structures, this is not difficu (Score:5, Informative)
It's quite practical to build completely fireproof homes. Some Californians do, which proves the rest can do that too.
Californian's are only at the beginning of their experience with eucalyptus trees, which are native to Australia. You're quite right, it's possible to build bushfire ( I think the US calls them wildfires) resistant homes. In Australia there are specific assessment and building requirements for a home likely to be affected by fire called BAL [csiro.au] and I think you also have to get a planning permit [vic.gov.au]
I had the experience of my neighborhood having a bushfire go through it. I realized how few people know just how terrifying the situation is when they asked "can't you just put it out with a garden hose?".
Not quite, the flames were 4-6 stories high, when it hit my neighborhood 18 houses burned down in about as many minutes. Generally a bush fire will have embers fly a few kilometres ahead of it, which is where you can try to stop it. The really bad ones create their own weather which looks like a firestorm and the worst ones creates a fire tornado, which is basically a small tornado throwing the stuff burning in it around.
This fire was stopped from getting my house by an empty block of land and a chopper hitting it with 10 tons of water. High BAL houses survived next to houses that were burning and have things like sprinkler systems on the roof that extinguish embers. However even if your house doesn't burn, the heat melts curtains to the glass, paint peels off interior walls.
You have no idea it's coming sometimes, we got about 5 minutes notice to evacuate, people literally escaped their homes with what they were wearing. I prepare my house for bushfires by cutting back the garden and we have go bags with clothes and important documents. I still have more to do though.
Fortunately there wasn't a loss of human life, lots of people pets panicked, ran before their owners could grab them and died - few people saw that coming. My poor neighbor, came home from breakfast with his wife to see his house on fire, they lost everything. My neighborhood is a ghost town now, people I've know for a long time just gone and it's a special kind of fucked to watch their houses being taken away in a skip bin.
If this thing helps even a little, I'd use it.
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Bizarrely, no, it's mostly Victoria, the southern-most mainland state, and south of Sydney.
I guess it's the cooler climate giving a different forest structure, among many other factors. Mind you, Melbourne had another temperature record the other day.
Aboriginals used to burn off to keep things under control, but westerners put a stop to that.
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Trust me, in California, you practically need a permit to get a permit. All our wonderful laws passed decades ago are now being weaponized the opposite direction to great affect. NIMBY-ism is strong, regardless of political party.
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It's quite practical to build completely fireproof homes. Some Californians do, which proves the rest can do that too.
wat
None of these things are difficult. Concrete domes shrug off embers. So do eaveless steel buildings which make ideal garages easy to erect with a very small crew (which I did).
Because you were able to do it physically and legally, anyone can do it! It's so simple!
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There are limits to how effective fire proof designs are. If you have enough fuel then the temperature x time can make everything inside a home burn; likewise concrete explodes in high enough temperatures as the trapped water turns to high pressure steam. Fire resistant designs help reduce the spread of fire which buys time for suppression, evacuation, and other strategies to rob fuel, but it is not a panacea if you have enough fuel.
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At most a mowed lawn and some flower beds for 100 feet is not a lot of fuel.
Of course rich people at the edge want to live right up to the trees, and then their expensive homes can provide the fuel to light up the neighbours.
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Maybe not difficult, but it does cost more. And additional cost will cause some people to be unable to afford a home. So as with everything, there is a cost/benefit analysis. Specifically in this situation, if the cost of increased resilience is more than the additional cost of insurance for less-resilient homes, then the cost of fireproofing might not be worth it.
Maybe. Or maybe not. (Score:5, Informative)
Trust the New York Post to breathlessly repeat a company's advertizing claims about the amazing things their technology can do. Here [arstechnica.com] is a different article that treats it more skeptically:
But two experts who spoke with Ars raised serious questions about the potential for this technology to supplant traditional sprinklers in a home. They are even more skeptical as to whether the technique can be effective in an uncontrolled wildfire situation, where flames can grow very quickly.
[...]
Wittasek said that if Sonic Fire Tech is going to claim that its product is as good as or better than the NFPA 13D standard, it should be able to provide a whole range of specifics, such as "who validated it, what test protocols were used, what fire scenarios were included, and how success was defined."
"I would want to see full-scale testing that includes typical residential fires like furniture and mattress fires, cooking fires, electrical fires, and attic or exterior ember exposures," he added. "It should also cover different conditions like open and closed doors, varying ceiling heights, crosswinds, obstructed fuel packages, and whether the fire comes back after the system shuts off."
Similarly, Michael Gollner, a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, and an expert in fire dynamics, told Ars there's simply not enough information yet to show that this technology works better than sprinklers.
He pointed to a 2018 academic paper, which found that "acoustics alone are insufficient to control flames beyond the incipient stage."
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Thank you, came here for exactly this!
It's immediately striking there are no independent validations of any of these self-interested claims by a commercial developer. It looks like an oversize bacckpack leaf blower. Nothing that seems like it could effectively cover a large area or a home interior. What, it's going to BLOW this through our HVAC ducts??
I'd also demand some solid safety certification of those claims of "harmless to pets and humans" . . .
And finally, yeah - the New York Post?? Sheesh!
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I dunno seems to work really well in YouTube videos. This guy did extensive testing, watch from the beginning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Will it scale up? (Score:1)
The San Bernardino County Fire Department recently tested out the equipment using a backpack version and the results were incredible. Video shows firefighters fighting small blazes on a shrub and a stove top fire with the technology putting it out...
OK, so it can put out a burning bush or stove-top fire, but how, exactly will this be deployed in the case of another Palisades fire? As a reminder, in the Palisades fire it was abandoned before it was fully out (no one stayed behind to make sure the wildfire was out), then, hours later, acres were burning - a couple guys with fancy backpack sound machines aren't going to stop it, any more than a couple guys with garden hoses. (PS, water availability was also a factor in Palisades, no matter what 2028 Presi
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I hope Newsom does run for President. It will be great watching another rich, straight white man be the Democratic front runner while also bullshitting his way through the campaign and pretending he has no responsibility for the direction California has been heading on numerous issues that are still getting worse.
I can't wait to see how the California primaries turn out, what with the ballots going out tomorrow but with to many stubborn Democrats on the ballot, all polling individually worse then the two Re
Even if it doesn't scale up... (Score:1)
If it's as effective against stovetop fires as the KMPH video indicates, some kitchen manufacturer should license this tech and build it into their vent hoods. Some sizable percentage of house fire start on stovetops, so killing them off early would be a good thing.
mp3? (Score:2)
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here, record the sound from this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Is that for real? (Score:2)
Sounds like BS.
Is real (Score:2)
Possible for civilian use? (Score:2)
Very interesting, think this will make it way into our homes?
Also curious how it doesn't harm animals....we've got a bit of oxygen in us, and kinda need it to breathe, it doesn't have any effect on that?
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I was curious about this as well. If you get rid of the oxygen, it could definitely have negative consequences in closed spaces. Maybe it's localized enough that the fire goes out but then air from other parts of the home can fill in the space soon enough.
Indeed, but not a new idea (Score:2)
Infrasounds are nothing else but wind.
Re: Indeed, but not a new idea (Score:2)
You push fire somewhere else, not in my front yard.
Finally (Score:1)
But can it scale up, wildfires ??? (Score:2)
Star Trek (Score:2)
I'm 90% sure I read about this in the TNG Technical Manual back in the 80's.
The film crews never adhered to it but it was a cool idea.
If miniaturized and adapted to a passive phased array they could be installed in the cargo holds of airplanes too.
hooray (Score:2)
When will they start deploying this to cities around the world? I expect that US firefighters will object strenuously to this advancement because it will mean no more overtime.
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old man yells at fire (Score:2)
Get off my lawn!
video (Score:2)
Second video down this page is a good one
https://kmph.com/news/local/ca... [kmph.com]
it sounds like a helicopter.
blow (Score:2)
It's essentially just blowing out the fire.
Rule #1 - Consider the source! (Score:2)
If this story about unnamed scientists "miraculously" extinguishing fires by vibrating oxygen atoms seems implausible, well, it's from the New York Post. How the hell did this drivel make it past meta-moderation?
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Something something AI.
Try a ... (Score:2)