Abstract:
This invention concerns a method, an apparatus, and a process to extinguish fire in areas or in high-rise buildings where the ground or highest floor is beyond the reach of standard fire equipment such as ground/aerial ladders or hoses. The apparatus is a missile-like device that is launched above or into a targeted area. It can be guided remotely from the ground by computer. It can accept commands from and transmit information to the ground crew.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
         [0001]    1. Field of the Invention  
           [0002]    The present invention relates to unmanned aerial fire extinguisher and firefighting strategies and tactics. More specifically, my invention is primarily relates to a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product for extinguishing fires in areas beyond the reach of standard fire equipment, such as floors on high-rise buildings.  
           [0003]    2. Description of the Prior Art  
           [0004]    The task of high-rise firefighting is monumental. No two high-rise fires are the same and firefighters must be aware of changing conditions and variances in dealing with such structures. Constructions of high-rise buildings vary, depending on when they were designed and built. Newer high-rises have features that were absent in the earlier era. These include the use of central heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems that move air throughout the building, and ceiling plenums that are used to return air to the system. These plenums are also used for the building&#39;s electrical and communications equipment. These buildings also contain large, uncompartmented and compartmented office spaces that allow for expanding fires. Their windows are also fixed and inoperable. The only way to vent a window is to break it—an undesirable tactic at fire operations in high-rise buildings.  
           [0005]    Battles in today&#39;s high-rise fires are fought within, with very little help from ground ladders and outside streams. Construction features, use and knowledge of building systems such as HVAC, standpipes, elevators and communications, understanding the theories behind fire and smoke movement play an integral part of fire operations in these buildings. The fact that colorless, poisonous, odorless gases may develop and kill both firefighters and civilians cannot be emphasized enough. One of the most difficult tasks in dealing with fires in high-rise buildings is getting the resources in place quickly especially in areas where standard fire equipment such as ladders and hoses cannot reach. High-rise construction, electrical failures, poor ventilation, and improper use of HVAC systems or elevators can become hazards that can lead to death or serious injuries to both firefighters and civilians. Sep. 11, 2001 is prime example of the rapid destruction caused by the burning inferno caused by airplanes that crashed into the Twin Towers and into the Pentagon. The height of the building, the extent of the fire, the chaos that ensued, and the amount of time needed to reach the levels of the fires all led to the worst one-day tragedy the United States has ever experienced. Currently, there is no effective method at all for the firefighters to fight against the fire in the areas beyond the reach of the standard fire equipment.  
           [0006]    What is needed then is a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that can be deployed rapidly for extinguishing fires in areas or high rise buildings where standard fire extinguishers or equipment cannot reach.  
           [0007]    Accordingly, it is a principal objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that can be deployed rapidly and is capable of extinguishing fires in areas or high-rise buildings beyond the reach of standard fire extinguishers or equipment and without risking the lives of firefighters.  
           [0008]    It is a further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of dealing with Class A fires—fires fueled by ordinary combustibles such as wood, paper plastics, etc. in an efficient way.  
           [0009]    It is a still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of extinguishing Class B fires—fires fueled by hazardous materials such as flammable and combustible liquids in an efficient way by excluding oxygen from the fire.  
           [0010]    It is a still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of traveling a known distance to an area or high-rise building under fire before discharging a layer of foam through a nozzle using an aqueous film forming foam (AFFF) agent and a subsurface technique to exclude oxygen from the fire.  
           [0011]    It is a still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of controlling the direction of the device electronically during its flight.  
           [0012]    It is a still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of delivering the proper amount of extinguishing foam agent to an area or high-rise building that is on fire beyond the reach of standard fire extinguishers or equipment and without risking the lives of firefighters.  
           [0013]    It is a still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of using the proper application in delivering the proper amount of extinguishing foam agent to an area or high-rise building that is on fire beyond the reach of standard fire extinguishers or equipment and without risking the lives of firefighters.  
           [0014]    It is still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of traveling a known distance to an area or high-rise building under fire before discharging a cloud of dry chemical fire retardant expelled by halon gas or carbon dioxide.  
           [0015]    It is a still further objective of my invention to provide a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product that is capable of discharging a layer of foam through a nozzle using an aqueous film forming foam (AFFF) agent and a subsurface technique to exclude oxygen from the fire.  
           [0016]    Other objects of my invention, as well as particular features, elements, and advantages thereof, will be elucidated in, or apparent from, the following description and the accompanying drawing figures.  
         SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
         [0017]    According to my present invention I have provided a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product for extinguishing fire in areas or high-rise buildings beyond the reach of standard fire extinguishers or equipment and without risking the lives of firefighters.  
           [0018]    The present invention provides a method for the rapid deployment of an aerial fire extinguisher to extinguish fires in areas beyond the reach of standard fire equipments. This method comprises generating a request to start said aerial fire extinguisher to extinguish fires in an area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments, said aerial fire extinguisher having a central controller, a sensor, an engine, a fuel container, a fire retardant material container, said fire retardant material container containing a fire retardant material, a discharging device, and a targeting control device, said targeting control device capable of controlling said aerial fire extinguisher to fly towards said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments; aiming said aerial fire extinguisher to said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments; launching said aerial fire extinguisher under the control of said central controller; flying into said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said aerial fire extinguisher under control of said central controller; landing at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said aerial fire extinguisher under the control of said central controller; and discharging a kind of fire retardant material carried by said aerial fire extinguisher under the control of said central controller.  
           [0019]    The present invention also consist of an apparatus that has an engine, a delivery system, a guiding device, a locating device, an extinguishing agent container, a compressed air foam system (CAFS), a hose line with an enductor attached to it, and a payload nozzle. Also consisting of the means to discharge a extinguishing agent of dry chemicals by halon gas or carbon dioxide  
           [0020]    The present invention further provides a computer program product having a computer readable medium having computer program logic recorded thereon for a method to control the direction of the apparatus during its flight and to control and monitor the creation and delivery of the foam agent used to extinguish the fire.  
       
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0021]    Other features of my invention will become more evident from a consideration of the following detailed description of my patent drawings, as follows:  
         [0022]    [0022]FIG. 1 is a structure layout of an embodiment of the aerial fire extinguisher;  
         [0023]    [0023]FIG. 2 is shown a brief flow diagram of another embodiment for my invention of a method for the rapid deployment of an aerial fire extinguisher to extinguish fires in areas beyond the reach of standard fire equipments;  
         [0024]    [0024]FIG. 3 is another structure of the current invention of an aerial fire extinguisher;  
         [0025]    [0025]FIG. 4 is the procedure to fly the current invention into an area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments;  
         [0026]    [0026]FIG. 5 is the procedure of discharging the fire retardant material carried by the aerial fire extinguisher; and  
         [0027]    [0027]FIG. 6 is another embodiment of the current invention of an aerial fire extinguisher.  
     
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT  
       [0028]    Referring now to the drawings, my invention concerns a method, an unmanned apparatus, and a computer program product for extinguishing fire in areas or high-rise buildings beyond the reach of standard fire extinguishers or equipment and without risking the lives of firefighters.  
         [0029]    Referring now to FIG. 1, which represents said aerial fire extinguisher  10 . There is an engine  1  that is used to launch and transport the apparatus toward a specified target. It contains a propulsion system that provides a driving force to move the apparatus  10  forward. For example, fuel or pressurized nitrogen thrusters can be used to blow fuel or nitrogen gas from a tank through a nozzle to move the apparatus forward. The aerial fire extinguisher  10  also has a locating device  2  used to locate a specified target. The aerial fire extinguisher  10  further has a computer-controlled delivery system  3  that controls the direction of the apparatus  10  during its flight and controls and monitors the creation and dispersion of the foam agent  4  contained by a container  5 . Application of foam depends on the type of foam used, the type of incident, the topographic, and the equipment used for the application. Application rates are important and formulas are used to calculate proper application rates and to determine if the correct amount of foam is on hand to mitigate the incident. The container  5  is made up of separate compartments, where at least three ingredients—air, water, and foam concentration are stored separately. The aerial fire extinguisher  10  has a compressed air foam system (CAFS) or dual-injection system  6 , which produces high-quality foam bubbles that are small and consistent in size and density. These bubbles allow the foam to stay together and provide a 25% better drain time for the foam, allowing the foam to work better and be more persistent. A foam pump  7  pumps the concentrate directly into the hose line  8 , which is metered by a flow-metered microprocessor. After the foam solution is created, an air compressor line  9  injects air into the hose line  8 . This creates turbulence inside the hose line  8  that creates better and more consistent foam. The CAFS  6  allows the operator to control the consistency of the foam from a runny, wet solution for quick knockdowns to a thick, dry foam for vertical exposure applications. The apparatus also has a hose with an added enductor (a device that siphons a liquid from a container into a moving stream) and can be used as an in-line proportioner to proportion the proper amount of foam concentrate for the specific type of fire. This is a critical factor when applying foam. Foam is made up of 90% or more water; the other 10% or less is the foam concentrate. The specific amount is dependent on the use of the foam blanket. For example, most manufacturers of foam require that they be proportioned at 6% for polar solvents and 3% for hydrocarbons. This means that a polar solvent fire should be extinguished with a foam blanket made up of air, 94% water, and 6% from concentrate, agitated to an effective foam blanket and applied correctly. If the product burning was a hydrocarbon, the foam blanket would be made up of air, 97% water, and 3% foam concentrate. At the end of the hose line  8  is a payload nozzle  12 . The payload nozzle  12  is used to finish making the foam by adding air to it at this point. Various types of foam nozzles, regular fog nozzles, and foam generators have the ability to aspirate various quantities of air into the foam solution. The goal is to get the correct expansion ratio, that is, amount of air added to the solution. The payload nozzle  12  is also used to apply the foam agent into the burning area. It is a tapered or constricted duct, tube, pipe, or the like through which a fluid is directed and from the open end of which the fluid is discharged. It is designed to meter the fluid or to produce a desired direction, velocity or shape of discharge. Foam from nozzles is applied using one of three techniques—bank-in technique in which the foam strikes the ground before the fire rolls into the fire, bank-back or bound-off technique in which the foam is banked off a wall or other object and rolls back into the fire, and the snowflake technique in which the foam is sprayed high into the air over the fire and it floats down onto it. The aerial fire extinguisher also has a guiding device  11 . This can be any automatic remote control system adopted on many weapon systems. It can include a pointing device, an infra-red or electromagnetic system for detecting the missile with respect to the pointing axis, and a computer on the ground to transform angular deviations with respect to the pointing axis and to generate remote control commands to bring the missile back to an axis parallel to the pointing axis. Also included is a system for transmission to the missile of commands generated on the ground, either through wires or electromagnetic waves.  
         [0030]    Such guidance systems which can be used with the present invention may be found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,262,596 of Allier et al issued Apr. 21, 1981 and entitled “Overhead Attack Missile”, and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,672,607 of Stauffet al issued Jun. 27, 1972 and entitled: Sighting Telescope Infra-red Direction Finder Unit in a Teleguiding Device for Missiles” and in U.S. Pat. No. 2,856,852 of Hinman, Jr. et al issued Oct. 21, 1958 and entitled “Proximity Fuse”. The guidance system according to U.S. Pat. No. 3,672,607 can bring the missile in the direction of the target within a cylindrical corridor having an axis parallel to the pointing axis. The missile is directed to the target so that the cylindrical corridor passes above the target. Moreover the missile is provided with a proximity fuse, for instance, of a type described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,856,852 which is set to trigger the missile when the missile passes above the target. Additional guidance systems which can be used with the present invention may also be found in U.S. Pat. No. 3,406,402 of Stauffet al entitled “Optical Aiming Device” and U.S. Pat. No. 3,293,985 of Stauffet al entitled “Firing Turret for Teleguided Missiles”.  
         [0031]    Referring now to FIG. 2, there is shown a brief flow diagram of one embodiment for my invention of a method for the rapid deployment of an aerial fire extinguisher to extinguish fires in areas beyond the reach of standard fire equipments. Said method  20  comprises several steps. The first step is to generate a request to start said aerial fire extinguisher to extinguish fires in an area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments  21 . Referring now to FIG. 3, which is another structure of said aerial fire extinguisher  50 . The aerial fire extinguisher  50  has a central controller  51 , a sensor  52 , an engine  53 , a fuel container  54 , a fire retardant material container  55 , a discharging device  56 , and a targeting control device  57 . Referring now to FIG. 2 again, the second step is to aim said aerial fire extinguisher  50  to said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments  22 . The third step is to launch said aerial fire extinguisher  50  towards the area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments  23 . Right after the launch, said aerial fire extinguisher  50  is under the control of said central controller  51 . Said central controller  51  is controlled either by a first pre-defined computer program or by a ground station. Said ground station can be operated by a second pre-defined computer program or by an operator. The fourth step is to fly into said area  24  beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said aerial fire extinguisher  50  under control of said central controller  51 . The fifth step is to land  25  at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said aerial fire extinguisher  50  under the control of said central controller  51 . The sixth step is to discharge  26  a kind of fire retardant material carried by said aerial fire extinguisher  50  under the control of said central controller  51 . Said discharging can be either an explosion or at a pre-defined speed. Said pre-defined speed is defined according to the fire condition at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments.  
         [0032]    The fourth step  24  can further be separated into the following steps. Referring now to FIG. 4. The step of flying  24  into said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said aerial fire extinguisher  50  under control of said central controller  51  further comprises flying towards  31  said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments; sending out  32  a first continues signal towards said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said targeting control device  57 ; receiving  33  a second continues signal bouncing back from said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said targeting control device  57 ; calculating  34  said second continues signal bouncing back from said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said targeting control device  57 ; and adjusting  35  the flying route of said aerial fire extinguisher  50  towards said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments by said targeting control device  57 .  
         [0033]    The sixth step  26  can further be separated into the following steps. Referring now to FIG. 5, wherein the step of discharging  26  a kind of fire retardant material carried by said aerial fire extinguisher  50  under the control of said central controller  51  further comprises evaluating fire conditions  41  on a continuously basis at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments via feedbacks from said sensor  52  to generate various results on a continuously basis; and discharging  42  a fire retardant material from said fire retardant material container  55  at a speed according to said various results.  
         [0034]    Referring now to FIG. 6, there is shown another embodiment for the present invention, an apparatus  60  for the rapid deployment of an aerial fire extinguisher  61  to extinguish fires in an area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments. Said apparatus comprises a fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  capable of reaching an area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments and a ground communication system  62 . The fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  60  can be launched from ground, ship, air or shoulder. The fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  60  is capable of being controlled directly by an operator on ground through said ground communication system  62 .  
         [0035]    The apparatus  60  further comprises a control system  64 , wherein said control system  64  is capable of controlling operation of said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  according to a per-installed computer program  65 . Said pre-installed computer program  65  can be a plurality of different computer programs to be used for different fire extinguishing operations. Said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  further comprises a monitoring system  66 , which is capable of monitoring operation of said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments. Said monitoring system  61  is capable of monitoring fire condition at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments even after said various foams being completely discharged from said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  60 . Said monitoring system  66  is also capable of providing information to said control system  64  to effectively control operation of said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  and to said air communication system  63  to communication to said ground communication system  62 . Said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  further comprises a delivery system  67 , which is capable of delivering said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  to said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments. Said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  further comprises a landing system  68 , which is capable of landing said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  on said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments. Said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  further comprises a discharge system  69 , which contains a plurality of fire retardant materials. Each of said plurality of said fire retardant materials has different heat resistance abilities. Said discharge system  69  is capable of mixing such plurality of fire retardant materials to generate various foams. Said various foams can be discharged at various pre-set speeds under the control of said control system  64  to extinguish different kinds of fire.  
         [0036]    Said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61  further comprises an air communication system  63 , which is controlled and operated by said control system  64 . Said air communication system  63  is capable of sending out real-time information about fire and environment at said area beyond the reach of standard fire equipments and receiving a commend to instruct said control device  64  to operate said monitoring system  66 , said delivery system  67 , said landing system  68 , and said discharge system  69 . Said real-time information includes direction, distance traveled and location of said fire retardant material delivery and discharge system  61 .  
         [0037]    As various possible embodiments may be made in the above invention for use for different purposes and as various changes might be made in the embodiments and methods above set forth, it is understood that all of the above matters here set forth or shown in the accompanying drawings are to be interpreted as illustrative and not in a limiting sense.