CAM-592

Downstairs the belt is jammed and upstairs nobody knows

The baggage basement. At the bend in the conveyor the cases have piled on top of each other and nothing is moving: forty-six jammed and more arriving behind. A handler is at the control panel with the red light on, looking at the pile; another is working further up the line. Downstream, the stretch comes out empty with a single case on it. And upstairs, behind the glass, the gate lounge carries on as if nothing were happening. IRIS sees that the belt has not moved a bag for three minutes and that luggage is stacking up, and says so straight away.

CAM-592 · BAGGAGE CONVEYOR · JAM AT THE BEND

What IRIS understands

What it recognises in this scene

cases jammed at the bend
cases stacking up behind
bend in the conveyor
handler at the control panel
control panel with the red light on
second handler further up the line
downstream stretch coming out empty
gate lounge above, behind the glass

What this camera measures

An alert says something is happening. The reading says how much.

3 min 10 sTime since it jammed
46Bags stuck at the bend
0 m/sBelt speed
120Bags waiting upstream
05:41:09Video starts at

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.

the conveyor stops moving bags

And alsoluggage stacks up at the bend

Then

alert the plant supervisor with the section, the time and how many bags are stuck
save the video from the minute before the jam, to see what caused it
alert the reclaim hall too, so they know why the belt has run dry

The instruction that set it up«Tell me if the conveyor stops moving bags and luggage stacks up at the bend.»

What changes

What changes for operations, for the passenger and for maintenance

A three-minute jam at the bend of a conveyor turns, half an hour later, into two hundred people upstairs staring at an empty belt and a queue at the claims desk. And it happens in the one place in the airport where nobody complains, because there is no public. With the alert, the plant supervisor knows while it is happening and with the video of that minute in front of him, so he knows whether it is a two-bag jam or something that will stop the whole line. What is recovered is not the bag: it is the half hour lost before anybody knew.

What people usually ask

Does IRIS stop the conveyor when it sees the jam?

No. IRIS touches no machine and decides nothing: it alerts the person at the control panel and the plant supervisor, with the section, the time and the video. Stopping a baggage line has knock-on consequences that have to be weighed by somebody who knows the plant, not by a camera. What IRIS brings is that this person finds out in the first minute instead of the thirtieth.

Doesn't the plant already detect this itself?

Often it does, and that signal says a motor has stopped or a sensor is seeing nothing pass. What it does not say is what the image shows: how many cases are piled up, whether the pile is growing, whether downstream is already running empty and whether somebody is at the panel. That difference is what decides whether you send one person or a whole team. IRIS does not replace the machine's signal: it puts the scene next to it.

Other cameras

The real interface, step by step

A camera looks. IRIS understands what it sees.

An extract of the real screen, no voice-over and hands-free. Each round poses another situation. What sits behind it is a good deal bigger than what you see.