Numerical Analysis of the Effect of Afterburning on Damage to the Concrete Structure Under Interior Explosion

A numerical simulation was performed to analyze how afterburning affects damage to a concrete structure when an explosive detonates inside a room. TNT was used as the explosive for the interior explosion. A reduced scale structure of a Korean apartment room was constructed with reinforced concrete and used as the target room for this research. Interior explosion experiments were performed using TNT 2 kg and TNT 3 kg explosives, to obtain data to verify and calibrate the numerical model. The numerical model was constructed to precisely simulate these interior explosions, especially considering the effect of afterburning, which is a significant phenomenon in enclosed spaces. Numerical simulations were performed with and without the effect of afterburning, and compared with the experiment results. The results showed that the numerical model could well simulate the effects of afterburning in an interior explosion, and that afterburning effects must be considered to more accurately analyze the damage to concrete structures.