PSI recordPSI-98Investigation dossier

SAFFIRE-I

Spacecraft Fire Safety Experiment-I

Principal investigator: David Urban
Platform: International Space Station (ISS)
Hardware: Saffire 1 enclosure in Cygnus
Dates: 03-02-2001 → 02-28-2008
Licence: CC0-1.0
PSI version: v4 · modified 03-Jun-2025
Publications listed: 6

PSI record (opens in a new tab)doi 10.60555/0t15-1z43 (opens in a new tab)psi.nasa.gov/physci/repo/data/investigations/PSI-98

Evidence proximity, not a safety rating. This page describes what was tested and where each value comes from.

Footprint · Microgravity

Where SAFFIRE-I’s runs sit in condition space, in the Atlas chart window. Other investigations’ runs in this regime are dimmed.

2 of 2 runs drawn.

Source: NASA PSI run tables (snapshot 2026-11-14) and the published papers listed under Sources. Evidence proximity, not a safety rating; not a hazard map.

Objective

As written in the PSI record:

The objectives of this investigation were to: (1) determine how rapidly a large scale fire grows in low-gravity and (2) investigate the low-g flammability limits compared to those obtained in NASA’s normal gravity material flammability screening test.

Fingerprint COMPUTED

Computed from the 2 run rows below: what varied, what was held constant, and what was never recorded.

Varied

Sample Number · 2 values
Percent O2 · 2 values
Burn Time (s) · 2 values
Flow Direction · 2 values
Camera 1 · 2 values
Camera 2 · 2 values

Held constant

O₂ 21.5 % · measured
Pressure 101.3 kPa · nominal (stated, not measured)
Flow 20.0 cm/s · measured
Material = SIBAL Fabric
Sample Thickness (cm) = 0.37
Sample Length (cm) = 40.6
Sample Width (cm) = 94
Air Flow (cm/s) = 20
Ignition Power (W) = 182
Ignition Time (s) = 8

Not recorded

every row records O₂, pressure and flow

Condition axes: what varied and what was held constant
Axis	State	Range	Basis	Recorded
O₂	held constant	21.5 %	measured	2/2
Pressure	held constant	101.3 kPa	nominal (stated, not measured)	2/2
Flow	held constant	20.0 cm/s	measured	2/2

Placeable: 2 of 2 record O₂ and can be placed (the engine can compute a distance); 2 also record pressure and appear on the charts.
Gravity: Microgravity (2)
Fuel classes: Solid · thin (2)
Flow regime: concurrent flow (1) · opposed flow (1)
Materials (1): SIBAL Fabric (2)
Outcomes: ignited (2)
Measured quantities: sample thickness [cm (as labelled)] (2) · burn time [s] (2)
Data-quality flags: approximate × 2: The source gives an approximate value or a range; the first value is used.
nominal-value × 2: A value stated in a document, not measured in this run.
suspect-unit × 2: The unit looks inconsistent with the values.
unverified-transcription × 2: Not yet checked against the primary source.
text-parsed × 1: The number was parsed from text in the cell (for example “20 cm/s”).

Where the runs sit: O₂ × pressure, zoomed to the data

2 of 2 runs record both ambient O₂ and pressure and are plotted.

Microgravity 2 runs

PSI run, pressure nominal (stated)
reference atmosphere

Source: the normalized O₂ and pressure of each run in the run table below (NASA PSI run tables or the cited paper); the original cell and any conversion are in each run’s provenance. Reference atmospheres are MARGIN’s presets. Not a hazard map.

Run table

Normalized values with the original cell beneath each. Inspect a row for its conversions, flags, source and distance to your scenario. 2 non-run rows in the CSV (notes or headers) were not treated as runs.

SAFFIRE-I: 2 runs from PSI-98_Experimental table_SAFFIRE-1.csv.

SAFFIRE-I: 2 runs. Each value cell shows the normalized value and, beneath it, the original cell as it appears in the source.
Row	Inspect	Material	Fuel class	g	O₂ %	Pressure kPa	Flow cm/s	Outcome	Flags
1		SIBAL Fabric	Solid · thin	µg	21.521.5 - 21.7	101.3 nominalstated in a document	20.0concurrent flow20	ignited	approximate, nominal-value, suspect-unit, text-parsed, unverified-transcription
2		SIBAL Fabric	Solid · thin	µg	21.5~ 21.5	101.3 nominalstated in a document	20.0opposed flow20	ignited	approximate, nominal-value, suspect-unit, unverified-transcription

Investigation dossier

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Reading the record, its runs and their sources.

SAFFIRE-I

Spacecraft Fire Safety Experiment-I

Principal investigator

David Urban

Platform

International Space Station (ISS)

Hardware

Saffire 1 enclosure in Cygnus

Dates

03-02-2001 → 02-28-2008

Licence

CC0-1.0

PSI version

v4 · modified 03-Jun-2025

Publications listed

Evidence proximity, not a safety rating. This page describes what was tested and where each value comes from.

Fingerprint COMPUTED

Computed from the 2 run rows below: what varied, what was held constant, and what was never recorded.

Varied

Sample Number · 2 values
Percent O2 · 2 values
Burn Time (s) · 2 values
Flow Direction · 2 values
Camera 1 · 2 values
Camera 2 · 2 values

Held constant

O₂ 21.5 % · measured
Pressure 101.3 kPa · nominal (stated, not measured)
Flow 20.0 cm/s · measured
Material = SIBAL Fabric
Sample Thickness (cm) = 0.37
Sample Length (cm) = 40.6
Sample Width (cm) = 94
Air Flow (cm/s) = 20
Ignition Power (W) = 182
Ignition Time (s) = 8

Not recorded

every row records O₂, pressure and flow

Condition axes: what varied and what was held constant
Axis	State	Range	Basis	Recorded
O₂	held constant	21.5 %	measured	2/2
Pressure	held constant	101.3 kPa	nominal (stated, not measured)	2/2
Flow	held constant	20.0 cm/s	measured	2/2

Placeable

2 of 2 record O₂ and can be placed (the engine can compute a distance); 2 also record pressure and appear on the charts.

Gravity

Microgravity (2)

Fuel classes

Solid · thin (2)

Flow regime

concurrent flow (1) · opposed flow (1)

Materials (1)

SIBAL Fabric (2)

Outcomes

ignited (2)

Measured quantities

sample thickness [cm (as labelled)] (2) · burn time [s] (2)

Data-quality flags

approximate × 2: The source gives an approximate value or a range; the first value is used.
nominal-value × 2: A value stated in a document, not measured in this run.
suspect-unit × 2: The unit looks inconsistent with the values.
unverified-transcription × 2: Not yet checked against the primary source.
text-parsed × 1: The number was parsed from text in the cell (for example “20 cm/s”).

Run table

SAFFIRE-I: 2 runs from PSI-98_Experimental table_SAFFIRE-1.csv.

SAFFIRE-I: 2 runs. Each value cell shows the normalized value and, beneath it, the original cell as it appears in the source.
Row	Inspect	Material	Fuel class	g	O₂ %	Pressure kPa	Flow cm/s	Outcome	Flags
1		SIBAL Fabric	Solid · thin	µg	21.521.5 - 21.7	101.3 nominalstated in a document	20.0concurrent flow20	ignited	approximate, nominal-value, suspect-unit, text-parsed, unverified-transcription
2		SIBAL Fabric	Solid · thin	µg	21.5~ 21.5	101.3 nominalstated in a document	20.0opposed flow20	ignited	approximate, nominal-value, suspect-unit, unverified-transcription