Augmented Reality Building Monitoring for Emergency Response
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Solution Overview
Problem
During building fires, emergency personnel often lack real-time data on the building's layout and occupant locations, complicating rescue efforts due to treacherous and rapidly changing conditions.
Innovation Solution
An augmented reality system that uses drones to collect data from sensors, such as smoke, occupancy, and temperature sensors, and overlays this information onto real-time video feeds, providing emergency responders with a virtual environment to facilitate effective emergency response planning.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If emergency personnel enter the building to rescue occupants, then rescue operations can be performed, but the risk to personnel increases due to treacherous and rapidly changing conditions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an augmented reality system as an intermediary between emergency personnel and the hazardous environment. The system uses drones to collect sensor data from the building and overlays this information onto video feeds worn by responders, allowing them to see through walls and detect hidden occupants without physically entering dangerous areas. This intermediary system reduces direct exposure to harmful conditions while maintaining rescue effectiveness.
2Loss of information
If traditional sensor systems are used to detect smoke and occupancy, then basic alarm functions are provided, but real-time spatial information and building layout data are not available to responders
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges multiple separate systems into a unified augmented reality platform. It combines drone-based sensor data collection, video feed transmission, and augmented reality display into a single integrated system. The system merges data from smoke sensors, occupancy sensors, temperature sensors, and camera feeds, then overlays all this information onto a single video feed that responders can view in real-time, providing comprehensive spatial awareness without requiring multiple separate devices.
3Reliability
If building layout information is updated in real-time as fire spreads, then accurate rescue planning is possible, but the complexity of monitoring and updating the layout increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a feedback mechanism where sensors continuously monitor environmental conditions (smoke density, temperature, occupancy) and automatically update the augmented reality display in real-time. As the fire spreads and conditions change, the system receives feedback from sensors and dynamically adjusts the building layout visualization to reflect current conditions, such as showing which areas are now inaccessible due to fire or smoke. This automated feedback loop maintains information accuracy without requiring manual intervention.
Data Source
AI summary
The present disclosure relates to an augmented reality system including one or more of a building, sensor(s), a gateway, a server, and a monitoring computer. The augmented reality system may further includes drones that capture video or other images of the building. The monitoring computer gathers information from the sensor(s) and/or drones and facilitates the creation of an augmented view of the building to provide intelligence to emergency responders.