Fragile A380?
I’ve been following the design and manufacture of the A388 with great interest of late, and just now a question popped into my head, which I’m hoping you guys might wish to comment on.
With the A388 design making unprecedented use of composites in the airframe structure, how are Airbus planning to protect the aircraft from perforations due to bird strikes/lightning strikes? We have all seen how lightning, birds and hail can completely destroy parts such as composite radomes, but Airbus are planning on using composite panels for major structural parts, such as the fuselage skin, and most of the THS and Vstab.
Airbus are using a large composite panel for the “leading edge” of the forward fuselage outer skin, extending from just aft of the cockpit to midway between the nose and the wing root. What happens when a 50lb vulture hits that at 250+kts, or if it takes a lightning hit?
Presumably these outer panels will form part of a normal pressure hull, so what are the consequences for maintaining pressurisation? From my (albeit limited) knowledge of the subject, composites tend to “shatter” (especially when cold soaked), whereas normal alloy type skins would leave a characteristic “petal” framed hole when punctured by, say, a bird impact. I can’t help but think that pressurising a composite hull to 9psi and then putting a gaping hole in it with 250kt airflow outside would have catastrophic results.
Any thoughts?