As part of the Air Force’s commitment to maintaining the safety of aircraft and personnel, hangars housing aircraft must have fire protection systems that meet military specifications. For decades, the standard required use of PFAS-containing Aqueous Film-Forming Foam (AFFF) because of the speed and reliability against reignition it provides. As part of a global effort ensuring the proper design and function of these deluge systems prior to 2020, AECOM performed fire protection and life safety inspections of over 700 aircraft hangars globally. We provided a standard inspection report for each hangar that included an order-of-magnitude estimate for correcting deficiencies. AECOM was subsequently contracted to provide staff augmentation to quickly ensure safety and fire protection while the DoD was transitioning from long-chain AFFF to short-chain. Our teams provided extensive remediation and engineering services that ensured hangars were meeting military requirements, and that changes in AFFF formulation would not result in reduced system performance during an emergency.

Our fire protection engineers performed over 250 hangar fire protection renovation project reviews and conducted over 50 final inspections as government representative. These projects included design/repair of hangar fire suppression, fire alarm/detection and life safety systems. Our team was integral in planning for demolition requirements for AFFF systems to include management of stock AFFF, rinsing /removal of infrastructure (pipes, valves), particularly for eliminating concerns that would arise from uncontrolled releases of PFAS-containing materials into the environment.

AFFF fire protection systems were replaced with high expansion foam systems—which requires designs that account for different physical performance while meeting military specifications. Our Fire Protection Engineers reviewed architectural/engineering firm drawings and specifications, and additional shop drawings from contractors. Because of our knowledge and expertise, AECOM staff represents AFCEC at all site inspections and attends design comment resolution meetings with designer-of-record and contractors, providing any fire protection support services required by the client.