SIMULACIÓN NUMÉRICA DEL FENÓMENO DEL BACKLAYERING EN EL TÚNEL MEMORIAL

Abstract

Road tunnels constitute key elements in the traffic net, especially for the long distance road transportation. In the case of fires, the control of the smoke propagation becomes crucial because the major risk for people is smoke inhalation rather than the direct exposure to the fire. However, research in this field has been limited by the inherent difficulties of the problem, and so there are few experimental data available. This paper presents a study on the control of the smoke propagation in road tunnels with a longitudinal air stream. The methodology is based on the numerical simulation of the time evolution of the air and smoke flows induced after the onset of localized fires of different magnitude. The general purpose of the paper is the refinement and contrast of a numerical procedure for the simulation of fire in tunnels with natural ventilation, as the particular case with the most complex and restrictive conditions, and the use of such procedure to study the backlayering phenomenon. The obtained results were compared with the natural and forced longitudinal ventilation tests of the Memorial Tunnel program as well as with available studies. Keywords: road tunnels; smoke propagation; natural ventilation; backlayering; MTFVTP