Case Study: West Virginia University achieves accurate predictive modeling of inflatable tunnel plugs with Dassault Systèmes' SIMULIA (Abaqus)

West Virginia University - Customer C Study

West Virginia University (WVU) was asked by U.S. Homeland Security to develop giant inflatable plugs to close vehicular tunnels and other large cylindrical structures in emergencies, but refining prototypes in a full‑scale test facility was complex and time‑consuming. To address this challenge, WVU used Abaqus Unified Finite Element Analysis (FEA) and SIMULIA CAE solutions from Dassault Systemes to create realistic simulations of folding, storage, deployment and inflation of plugs inside full‑size tunnel models.

Using Dassault Systemes’ SIMULIA/Abaqus, WVU modeled folding, positioning, settling, inflation sequences and detailed contact/conformance with tunnel walls; the predictive simulations closely matched large‑scale test behavior (especially when airflow sequencing was included), giving the team confidence to reduce costly physical testing, refine deployment designs, and estimate quantities not obtainable from experiments—enabling further development and application of the approach to other infrastructure systems.

West Virginia University

Eduardo M. Sosa

Research Professor