CAM-32
Burst water main
A water main has burst and the pipe is now exposed in the middle of the road. Water has flooded the whole junction and cars are still driving through it.

Turn on IRIS Vision
AI-generated image
What IRIS understands
What it recognises in this scene
- burst pipe
- open excavation
- worker
- vehicle in the water
- vehicle
- barrier
- pedestrians
The rule
You decide once. IRIS applies it always.
If
standing water appears on the roadway
Duringmore than 3 minutes
And alsothe wet area keeps growing
Then
- alert the water company
- close the junction to traffic
- measure the area affected
The instruction that set it up«Tell me if water is building up on the road, and how far it has spread.»
What changes
What changes for whoever runs the city
A burst main shows up in the street first and in the network second. Between the resident's call, somebody working out which stretch it is and the crew getting there, water runs all night, the road base washes out underneath and the junction ends up closed at the worst possible hour. With IRIS the traffic operator and the water company get the same alert from the first pool of water, with the image in front of them. The sooner that operator closes the junction, the fewer cars drive over pavement that is losing its base, and the less street has to be dug up afterwards.
What people usually ask
Can IRIS tell leak water from rainwater?
IRIS tells leak water from rainwater to a large extent, because it looks at how the sheet of water behaves: a leak grows from one specific point and keeps growing even when it is not raining, and it usually comes with broken surfacing around it. Even so, the rule can be crossed with the council's own rainfall data so it stays quiet during a storm. The decision to send a crew still belongs to the person handling the alert.
Does IRIS warn before the water reaches ground floors and garages?
IRIS warns as soon as water gathers where it should not be, and that is usually well before it reaches a doorway or a garage. What the water utility gains is time: finding out from the camera instead of from a resident's call once the water is already inside. What it cannot do is detect a leak that is still under the asphalt and has not surfaced.
Can IRIS say how much of the street is flooded?
IRIS can say how far the water has spread within the camera's field of view, marked on the image itself and against the zones that have been drawn. It is an approximate surface, useful for deciding whether to close the whole junction or just one lane. It is not a flow or depth measurement: that needs other sensors.
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.
- The alert fires
- You open it
- You confirm or dismiss
Next step
The city
Who watches the cameras of a whole city?
23 cases: 18 raise an alert when something happens and 5 only measure. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
The motorway
Who watches an entire motorway?
10 cases: 8 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
A recording gets watched when nothing can be done.An alert lands while there is still time to act.
IRIS raises the alert while it is happening and says where: the camera, the time and the images from that moment. With that, whoever is on duty is still in time to act.
Tell us your problem and we will say whether IRIS understands it, or not yet.
We reply the same working day.