IndustryEnvironment and cleanliness
CAM-344
Flame and black smoke on the transformer
Almost midday. At the top of the transformer, level with the bushings, there’s live orange flame, and out of it rises a column of black smoke that goes straight up and disappears over the rooftops of the neighborhood. The rest of the yard is untouched: the disconnectors clean, the control house shut, the gate shut and not one person inside the fence. The site is on its own and the fire is under way fifty yards from the houses.
Turn on IRIS Vision
AI-generated image
What IRIS understands
What it recognizes in this scene
- flame at the top of the transformer
- column of black smoke
- power transformer
- yard disconnectors
- control house
- main gate, shut
What this camera measures
An alert says something’s happening. The reading says how much.
- 25 sFlame visible for
- 1Points of flame in view
- 0People inside the compound
- 14Homes in frame
- 0Access points open for the response
- 11:52Time of the alert
The figures on this screen are an example from the illustration, not any client’s measurement.
The rule
You decide once. IRIS applies it always.
If
flame or smoke appears on the transformer or on any equipment in the yard
Then
- alert the control room with the camera, the machine affected and the time it started
- keep the video from one minute before the first smoke
- open the live view of the camera for whoever coordinates the response
The instruction that set it up«Tell me the moment there is smoke or flame on any machine in the yard, even with nobody there.»
What changes
What changes for whoever answers for the plant
The fire crew calls on the way and the first thing they ask is where to get in and which machine is burning. A transformer on fire in the middle of a neighborhood means smoke over the houses and a street to close. This camera puts out nothing: it gives the control room the picture, the exact minute it started and which machine it is, so it can be said on the phone while the engine is still on its way. With a thermal camera you can go earlier still, because it reads the heating that shows from outside when there isn’t even smoke yet. That turns a four in the morning breakdown into scheduled work.
What people usually ask
Can it warn before there’s any flame?
Yes, if the camera is a thermal one. IRIS works with the cameras already installed. With a normal camera it sees what can be seen: smoke, flame, a visible change. With a thermal camera it reads heat, because in that image heat is the image, and it can point at a connection or a bushing that’s heating up while there’s still no smoke. What it doesn’t do, in either case, is replace the machine’s electrical protection or promise degrees.
Doesn’t the transformer’s own protection already detect this?
Yes, and the camera doesn’t compete with it. The protection acts on the machine, and that’s its job; IRIS operates nothing. What the protection doesn’t give you is the picture: what can be seen from outside, where the smoke is going, whether the fire has spread to something else, whether there’s anyone inside the compound and where the fire crew can get in. None of that’s in any relay, and it’s exactly what the person picking up the phone needs.
Does IRIS trigger the extinguishing system or cut the supply?
No. IRIS doesn’t act: it doesn’t trigger extinguishing systems, doesn’t open or close anything and doesn’t leave any installation dead. It reports what’s happening, right away, with the picture and the time, and there its job ends. Deciding what gets switched and in what order is the control room’s call, following its own procedures, and putting the fire out is whoever runs the emergency plan’s. A camera making decisions on its own about a high-voltage machine would be a problem, not an improvement.
Other cameras
- CAM-340 · Someone is walking through a compound that is always empty
- CAM-341 · The fence is down and someone is coming through the gap
- CAM-342 · Eleven minutes parked where nobody ever stops
- CAM-343 · A cabinet is being emptied of its copper
- CAM-345 · A trail of oil under the transformer
- CAM-346 · The flash nobody was there to see
The real interface, step by step
Watch what happens. Then watch what IRIS does with it.
Not a recorded video and not a drawing: it’s a summary of the real tool, with a different case each time round. The whole tool doesn’t fit in a box.
- The alert fires
- You open it
- You confirm or dismiss
Next step
Who sees the sales that never reach the register?
10 cases: 4 raise an alert when something happens and 6 only measure. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
Who is watching when the load swings over somebody?
11 cases: 9 raise an alert when something happens and 2 only measure. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
And the best part
You can ask which van came in yesterday.Who was inside isn’t a question you ask here.
IRIS searches for things and situations, not people: it identifies nobody and recognizes no faces. You write what you’re looking for and it returns the matching minutes.
Tell us your problem and we’ll say whether IRIS understands it, or not yet.
A person answers, the same working day.