Abstract The effects of air stream velocity,fuel injector pressure drop and flameholder radial position on fuel distribution of vertical spraying from a plain orifice injector in high speed transverse air stream are experimentally investigated for a barchane dune flameholder.The fuel concentration distribution is measured by means of heating sampling probe and infrared analyzer.The experimental data are compared to the fuel distribtuion of horizontal spraying from the injector.The rcsults show that the vertical spraying is superior to the horizontal one in matching with the barchane dune flameholder,and the manner of fuel spraying relative to air stream is the key factor for fuel distribution to match barchane dune flameholder well.