Effect of metro train on the critical driving force for preventing smoke back‐layering in tunnel fires

Summary Preventing smoke back‐layering in longitudinal‐ventilated tunnels is an important topic in handling with fires safety issues. Previous studies focused on the critical velocity, while only very few of them paid attention to how to realize this parameter, that is, in a critical state, to overcome the resistance of the tunnel and the fire source to the airflow, the required driving force provided by the ventilation equipment installed in the tunnel. This study addressed this problem in the situation where the coupling effect of blockage and throttling effect was highlighted by conducting theoretical analysis and numerical simulations. The results showed that the presence of metro train blockage reduces the effective cross‐sectional area of the tunnel near the fire source and decreases the critical velocity. On the other hand, the blockage of trains also increases the resistance to the ventilation airflow and exacerbates the throttling effect, leading to the increase of the critical driving force. In such conditions, a stronger driving force to approach the critical velocity was needed. Besides, the length of train blockage was verified to exert limited influence on the value of critical velocity while it significantly affected the critical driving force. Furthermore, the calculated formula for the critical driving force was proposed with the prevention of smoke back‐layering considering the blockage effect to be emphasized.