AiS Challenge Team Abstract

Team Number: 023

School Name: Bosque School

Area of Science: Engineering

Project Title: Avaition Safety

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During the week of September 4-17 this year it was found from the F.A.A. Preliminary Accident and Incident site that there were 18 fatal accidents of fixed wing aircraft. This is why we selected a project that will model an improved safety feature of an airplane. We feel that some of these accidents could have been prevented and we will model the effectiveness of the safety feature.

Our project is to model the flight of a fixed wing aircraft and how its impact when it hits the ground can be changed because of different materials that could be attached to different areas of the aircraft. We will assume that materials such as foam, springs and parachutes could be deployed if necessary so that upon impact the aircraft would not explode. We will assume that the aircraft is still mostly intact. Some factors that are important are the weight of the aircraft, the altitude from which the aircraft started the descent, the ground terrain on which the aircraft will hit, the speed at which the aircraft is traveling, the aerodynamics of the aircraft, the weather at the time of the descent, the time that the aircraft has been in flight, the experience of the pilot and co- pilot, and the angle of the descent. We will start by taking a predetermined altitude and an aircraft and testing the freefall of that aircraft and then expanding from there. We understand that all fixed wing aircraft accidents could not be stopped but we believe that this is an important issue that must be investigated.

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Team Members

• Colin Williams
• Conner Hite
• Chloe Williams

Sponsoring Teacher(s)

• Debbie Loftin
• Tom Allen

Project Mentor(s)

• Dorothy Ashmore