Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

I am a junior and planning on entering in science fairs next year. I have been thinking about focusing on ways to help prevent the spread of wildfires, and had an idea but don't know if it would work or where to start.
I want to make a fire detector specific for forest areas, it would detect the fire, then admit a low-frequency sound to help neutralize the fire and alert local departments. I know that there are large detectors in forest regions, but I think having more detectors in these regions and experiment with the low-frequency sound that can help stop the fires before they spread.
My questions are:
Is this an Intel ISEF worthy project?
Is this project achievable?
Who should I reach out to for help?

Hi gpence20,

Sounds like you're off to a great start with your project. Based on your description I think this may be an engineering project. It's an interesting topic and could be worthy of the ISEF if the project is done very well.

Whether a project is achievable depends on the details of what you are trying to accomplish. For example, you may be able to build a small-scale model of the system you described. But you might not accomplish a system that protects a 100 acre forest.

My suggestion for a next step is to start some background research on your topic and begin setting some achievable design goals for your engineering project. The advice in the following link may be useful to you:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ompetition

I hope this helps. Please ask again if you have more questions.

A. Norman