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Public Safety lightning Protectom neproject In the complex business of aerospace employed a development, advancing technology on occasion specially- heightens an existing problem - and equipped therefore spawns hrther advancements of a research corrective nature. An example is the airplane, increasing use of composite materials, whosejob introduced to aircraft design to gain strength it was to while reducing weight, and digital electronic seek out systems that offer greater efficiency in flight and thunderstom engine control. Both technologies tend to make aircraft more susceptible to lightning damage.. B-ut r.ese a.r ch by NASA, the rederal Aviation Administration (FAA) and other aviation groups has substantially hope of getting struck by lightning. It was highly improved understanding of how lightning affects successful - more than 800 strikes were recorded. aircraft and produced countermeasures that allow The program proved to be a giant step in advancing plane builders to knowledge of lightning hazards and generating I incorporate these protective technology. performance-enhancing A key player in both the research program and technologies while the transfer of the technology to the aircraft industry improving safety. is Lightning Technologies, Inc., Pittsfield, NASA played the Massachusetts, a small engineering and testing firm leading role in lightning engaged in design and verification of protection investigations with its against lightning and other electrical hazards. seven-year (1980-86) Lightning Technologies is a spinoff company. It was Storm Hazards Research founded in 1977 by president J. Anderson Plumer, a Program, undertaken at former employee of a NASA contractor - General Congressional direction Electric Company's High Voltage Laboratory - who - by Langley Research had acquired extensive experience in lightning Center - to determine investigations. Shown at left beside a 1.5 million volt the dangers of generator used for lightning simulations, Plumer is an thunderstorms to example of the personnel-type of spinoff, wherein commercial aviation. The NASA technology is transferred to the private sector project employed a by the occupational shift of a scientist or engineer specially-equipped, once engaged in NASA research activity. protected F-106B In addition, much of the company's research airplane, whose technological capability stemmed from its work as job it was to seek out supporting contractor for the Storm Hazards thunderstorms in the Research Program, which involved assisting NASA in believed - the plane's extremities, such as wings, Multiple- propeller tips and certain other areas. That finding is of great importance to designers employing burst composite materials, which are less conductive, hence more vulnerable to lightning damage than the lightning aluminum alloys they replace. Lightning Technologies uses its NASA-acquired strikes i?aject experience and technology to develop protective measures for both electronic systems and composite a lace structures, including better electrical bonding and - - shielding methods for interconnecting wiring and number of planning the program, improving and vedying the methods of increasing system immunity through lightning protection for the F-106B and, together with improved computer software and application of randomly other organizations, analyzing the data. Both the surge-suppression devices. The company also company and its president worked extensively with provides protection design and verification testing occurring the SAE Lightning Subcommittee, which formulates services for complete aircraft systems or their standards for aircraft lightning protection. The individual components; it numbers most major electric experience and technology thus gained has made the aircraft and component manufacturers among its company a leader in lightning protection for worldwide clients. currents into aerospace systems. The accompanying photos illustrate some of Among the findings of the Storm Hazards Lightning Technologies work: the center photo the airplane Research Program, Langley researchers learned that shows a simulated lightning strike on a model of an multiple-burst lightning strikes inject a large number F-106 similar to the one of randomly occurring electric currents into the used in the NASA airplane, producing rapidly changing magnetic fields research program; above that can induce erroneous responses, faulty right, a full-size aircraft commands or other upsets in sophisticated electronic component undergoes a systems. high-voltage lightning This led the FAA - and airworthiness cerhfying test; at right, a company authorities in other countries - to require, beginning technician prepares a in 1987, that aircraft electronic systems which model of an airplane perform flight-critical functions be protected from fuselage for computer damage or upset due to the effects of the multiple- analysis. burst lightning environment. The NASA research produced another important finding: that lightning strikes may hit almost any spot on an airplane surface, not just - as earlier