New Technology to Help Connecticut Firefighters
If there is a fire at your house, you rely on firefighters to get you and your family out alive. But what happens when the rescuer becomes trapped?
Wallingford, CT -- If there is a fire at your house, you rely on firefighters to get you and your family out alive. But what happens when the rescuer becomes trapped?
It's a nightmare scenario. A firefighter missing inside a burning building. The search is a guessing game while the rescuers feel their way from room to room trying to find their missing man. However new technology developed with the help of a Connecticut firefighter could make it easier to find a fireman in a burning building.
Wallingford lieutenant Steve Alsup approached a Colorado company that pioneered technology to find skiers after an avalanche. With his help, Exit Technologies developed the Firefighter Tracker, a small yellow box firefighters wear on their belt. If they find themselves in trouble, anyone else with one of these boxes can find them.
The device points an arrow toward the fallen firefighter. A counter on the device helps rescue crews find their target. The device works with meters. As the meters go numerically down, the rescuer gets closer and closer to his target.
Each firefighter tracker costs four hundred dollars. Right now they are being used in Wallingford as well as in several other departments nationwide.
In addition to being a Wallingford firefighter, Lieutenant Alsup is also now a paid consultant for the company that makes the Firefighter Tracker.
