NASA Vortex Combustion tech stops fires cold

This week the folks at the Orbital Technologies Corporation aka ORBITEC of Madison, Wisconsin, have successfully utilized NASA tech to make a fire extinguisher work better and faster than ever before. NASA's vortex combustion technology has before now just been developed by ORBITEC to work with rocket engine design. What ORBITEC's subsidiary company HMA Fire has done is take the same concept and put a fire out in record time with much less effort than ever before.

This new system we're speaking about here is being tested on empty houses at Vandenberg Air Force Base as we speak. What's been found thus far is that this 20-gallon-per-minute, 1,400 pound-per-square-inch (psi) discharge capability beast has a much better chance of putting out a fire quicker than the standard unit. This unit is being compared to a standard 100-gallon-per-minute, 125 psi standard hand line which is generally controlled by several firemen at once.

The old system was able to put out a fire in 1 minute and 45 seconds using 220 gallons of water – again needing several firemen to make it work. The new system, on the other hand, requires just one person to operate and does the same job in 17.3 seconds using 13.6 gallons of water. This is why we invest in NASA, ladies and gentlemen, this.

[via Discover Magazine]