Brief History of Advanced Aircraft Extinguishers, Total Flood Corporation, and Enk Aviation
AAE is an international contractor for fire protection systems and equipment. Advanced Aircraft Extinguishers, Ltd. (dba AAE, Ltd) was founded in 1990 and built upon William A. Enk Senior’s expertise in aircraft fire safety systems. Mr. Enk began his journey in aviation fire safety with his wife, Mary-Terese Enk, back in 1970 when they lost a dear friend in an aircraft fire. From that tragedy, Bill and Mary-Terese started “Enk Aviation” which later became “Total Flood Corporation” and finally “AAE, Ltd” which is still in business today, over 50 years later.
Throughout the years, Mr. Enk’s extensive expertise and experience has been critical to the engineering, design, certification, manufacturing, and delivery of over 1500 aircraft fire protection systems that are installed in the lower cargo compartments, main deck compartments, lavatories, engines, etc. of smaller general aviation aircraft such as the Kingair, Challenger, Piper, Cessna, and larger Transport Category aircraft such as the Boeing B737 Classics, Airbus A320, Fokker F100, Fokker F70, etc., many of which are still in operation today around the world.
In 1997, AAE was the first to respond with a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) STC-approved modification to the new FAA mandate that required all United States Airlines and operators of Transport Category Passenger Aircraft to modify their lower Class “D” Cargo Compartments to a Class “C” Cargo Compartment by installing Smoke Detection and Fire Suppression systems. Our Cargo Fire Protection Safety Kit designs provide Smoke Detection in less than 60 seconds and provide Fire Suppression for at least 60 minutes. Longer durations of protection (ie, 90 minutes, 140 minutes, 180 minutes, 240 minutes, etc.) are also available.
The European Aviation Safety Administration (EASA) is now requiring the same – see the Commission Implementing Regulation 202-1159 dated August 5, 2020, which amends Regulations (EU) No. 1321/2014 and (EU) No. 2015/640 – introducing new airworthiness requirements for Class “D” cargo compartments et al. The EASA rules, however, are more stringent in that they require a metering suppression system that maintains at least 3% concentration “everywhere” (at all points) in the cargo compartment for the required duration of protection.
AAE’s Cargo FPS designs and configurations are approved by EASA and many other civil aviation authorities around the world, and meet the more stringent suppression performance requirements of EASA.
AAE holds nine (9) FAA Supplemental Type Certificates “STCs” for numerous designs that can be installed on over 20 different models of Transport Category Aircraft. And AAE holds FAA Parts Manufacturing Approval “PMA” for unlimited cargo FPS kit configurations.
Today, AAE still provides Fire Protection Systems and designs, which now include military aircraft “engine” compartments. Our latest design is a new Fire Protection Appliance that provides autonomous smoke detection and fire extinguishing/suppression for inaccessible areas like Unit Load Devices, Ground Transportation, Wind Turbines, Power Stations, etc.