Oct. 03, 09 | Thanks to the Video Fire Controller from Siemens, firefighters can now take a look at a blaze before they leave the firehouse. In case of an alarm the people in the control room can receive live video footage instantly, enabling fire crews and other emergency services to analyze the nature of the alarm and also the scope of the danger. What’s more, in the event of a deliberate false alarm, evacuation of a building can be stopped.

Firefighters and emergency services personnel are often called out unnecessarily as a result of false alarms, generating significant costs in the process. In Germany false alarms are the third most frequent reason that firefighters are called out. Using the Video Fire Controller, the fire department can enhance its response to false alarms. In addition, by providing a stream of high-quality video images, the new system supplies valuable information that helps firefighters to judge the danger of a genuine situation long before they reach the scene of the fire. Employees in the control room can monitor the extent of the fire and how rapidly it is spreading. This helps the crew to prepare for the response with greater efficiency.

The live images are provided by means of LAN streaming. The corresponding data files are compressed in the common MPEG-4 format and can either be viewed on monitors at the scene of the fire or remotely accessed via a standard Web browser and viewed on computer screens. A further advantage of the system is that in the event of an alarm, it saves the video images on an internal SD memory card. This can make it easier to determine the cause of a fire.

The video data files are protected against unauthorized access by means of passwords, user profiles, and an integrated firewall. Installation and configuration are straightforward: The cameras are connected, via the Video Fire Controller, to the Sinteso fire detection system from Siemens. This links the various fire detectors with the control panels for individual floors of a building and other peripherals such as alarm systems. For purposes of remote access, the system is connected to the Internet by means of an Ethernet cable.