The National Institute for Standards and Technology has published a comprehensive report for Smart Fire Fighting which includes all areas of fire prevention and protection engineering and fire service emergency response, and it addresses all phases of resilience (i.e., pre-incident, during an incident, and post-incident). Smart Fire Fighting will transform traditional fire protection and fire fighting practices to ensure the flow of critical information where and when it is needed.

In 2013, fire departments in the United States responded to more than 480,000 structure fires, resulting in approximately 2,850 civilian fatalities, 14,000 injuries, and estimated property losses of $10 billion dollars. More than 30,000 fire fighters were injured on the fireground. These losses can be significantly reduced by exploiting new opportunities in technology development, including cyber-physical systems through the fusion of emerging sensor and computing technologies with building control systems, fire-fighting equipment, and apparatus. Cyber-physical systems will revolutionize fire fighting through a range of approaches most notably represented by collecting the data globally, processing the information centrally, and distributing the results locally.

Smart Fire Fighting Fire prevention is an essential element of Smart Fire Fighting. This will be achieved by enhancing the power of information through enhanced data gathering, processing, and targeted communications. An evolving range of databases and sensor networks will be tapped to create, store, exchange, analyze, and integrate information into critical knowledge for the purpose of Smart Fire Fighting. Engineering, developing, and deploying these systems will require new measurement tools and standards, among other technology developments. This roadmap identifies and addresses high-priority measurement science research challenges, technical barriers, and related research and development gaps that hinder widespread application of Smart Fire Fighting technologies and systems to enhance building and community fire protection.

There are more than 30,000 fire departments in the United States and almost as many operating procedures for fighting fires. Why is that? Because there are no national standards for such procedures! While standards exist for training, equipment, and other key focus areas, tactics and strategies typically are controlled by three major factors: (1) the experience and judgment of the IC; (2) limited data that are either visually observed or derived from the operating environment, such as a fire alarm panel or fire command center; and (3) jurisdictional standard operating procedures. At a fire incident, the variation in these factors can be tremendous. If the fire service is working without specific and reliable information regarding the fire location, history, and projected growth; the building geometry and its contents; the location of occupants and fire-fighting personnel; the fire suppression activities and their consequences; and the status of fire protection assets, then their response strategy will continue to rely on experiential judgment.

View full report here: http://npstc.org/download.jsp?tableId=37&column=217&id=3461&file=NIST_SP_1191_FirefightingRoadmap.pdf

Approximately 50 participants attended the annual VQIPS public safety video workshop on June 17-18, in Newark, New Jersey.  Sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security, Science and Technology Directorate (DHS S&T), the agenda included a wide range of topics involving all aspects of public safety video use, including fixed video systems, portable/deployable video units and body camera units.  FirstNet, the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST), and the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) all presented at the workshop.

VQiPS stands for “Video Quality in Public Safety.” The advisory group focuses on “all things video,” including policy issues; case studies; technology; and video retrieval, analysis, and storage. One of the key themes of this year’s event was an examination of numerous policy issues confronting local public safety agencies as they implement video systems.  These include topics such as storage, chain of custody, public release, purchase considerations, and long-term operating and maintenance concerns.  Many public safety video systems record high definition images which consume large amounts of storage space.  These files are sometimes compressed by agency IT administrators in an attempt to reduce storage costs.  However, compression of video files greatly reduces their evidentiary value and can result in poor performance from analytical software.

It is important for agencies to have formal plans for video retrieval, analysis and storage that track the chain of the video evidence from the scene to the courtroom.  Problems associated with the public release of video were also discussed, including discussions on which agency actually owns the content in a multi-agency system.  A VQIPS working group is creating a document that will identify best practices and other considerations to help agencies create model policies.

Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Video Use

NPSTC gave a presentation on prehospital use of video by EMS personnel.  This session focused on information being compiled by NPSTC after polling paramedics, medical directors and emergency department managers on preferred methods of video use.  A number of divergent views were identified in the report as well as some strong consensus on use of video in certain patient care scenarios. Issues of privacy, security, and video ownership were also discussed.

Click here to view the presentation. NPSTC also operates a Video Technology Advisory Group (VTAG) which works with the DHS public safety video VQiPS group.  You can join the VTAG group by clicking here.

Evolving Video Technology

Several presentations were given at the workshop to demonstrate the evolving state of video technology and analytics to assist public safety.  New generation cameras are able to compensate for a variety of lighting conditions and are being tested for other uses.  For example, testing is underway to determine if a camera can detect a smoke haze more effectively than a smoke detector.  New speech-to-text software modules also coming to the marketplace will allow rapid searches for key words present in an officer’s body camera audio and other voice files, including 911 and radio).   Interconnected cameras are also able to identify a suspect who breaches a security perimeter and initiate their own pan/tilt/zoom tracking of the suspect.  These new systems can also automatically “hand off” the track to the next camera based on the location and direction of the suspect. Continue reading →