Indoor fire monitoring based on look-up-from-floor sensing of ceiling

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12292340-B2
Application number	US-202318528877-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 5, 2023
Priority date	Aug 24, 2021
Publication date	May 6, 2025
Grant date	May 6, 2025

Abstract

In an indoor environment on fire, automatic deployment of sensors disposed on, beneath or over the floor to look upward the ceiling to observe a body of smoke and flame risen near the ceiling allows important information regarding states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame to be gathered at an early stage of fire (e.g. before arrival of firefighters). By distributing the sensors over the indoor environment, the states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame are monitored holistically (i.e. as a whole) even at the early stage of fire. Such information is useful to predict development of the fire. In one implementation, a sensor is held in an infrastructure sensor holder mounted on the ceiling during normal time. Upon detecting occurrence of fire, the sensor drops from the holder to land on the floor and orients a sensing direction vertically upward to perform monitoring.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for monitoring progress of a fire in an indoor environment, the indoor environment having a ceiling and a floor, the method comprising: upon detecting the fire in the indoor environment, immediately deploying a plurality of sensors to sense a body of smoke and flame risen near the ceiling for monitoring states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame at least at an early stage of the fire, wherein the deploying of the plurality of sensors to sense the body of smoke and flame comprises: disposing the plurality of sensors on, beneath or over the floor such that an individual sensor deployed at a selected location of the floor is closer to the floor than to the ceiling and such that a sensing direction of the individual sensor is oriented vertically towards the ceiling, allowing the individual sensor to remotely sense the body of smoke and flame while avoiding the individual sensor to approach or contact the body of smoke and flame; remotely sensing, by the individual sensor, the body of smoke and flame in a vertical direction towards the ceiling to thereby generate a sequence of sensed data measured for the selected location; and transmitting, by the individual sensor, the sequence of sensed data to a computing server; receiving, by the computing server, a plurality of sensed-data sequences generated from the plurality of sensors at respective selected locations of the floor; and analyzing, by the computing server, the plurality of sensed-data sequences to determine the states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame over the respective selected locations of the floor, thereby allowing the states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame to be holistically monitored even at the early stage of the fire; and
further comprising: installing one or more selected sensors beneath the floor with a corresponding sensing direction of an individual selected sensor being oriented vertically towards the ceiling, the one or more selected sensors being included in the plurality of sensors, wherein the disposing of the plurality of sensors on, beneath or over the floor includes raising the individual selected sensor to fully or partially expose the individual selected sensor above the floor for remotely sensing the body of smoke and flame.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the deploying of the plurality of sensors to sense the body of smoke and flame further includes removing a protection cover of the individual selected sensor so as to enable the individual selected sensor to remotely sense the body of smoke and flame.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising: installing one or more selected sensors in the indoor environment before occurrence of the fire such that an individual selected sensor is held in an infrastructure sensor holder mounted to the ceiling, the one or more selected sensors being included in the plurality of sensors, the individual selected sensor being connected to the infrastructure sensor holder through a connecting member; wherein the disposing of the plurality of sensors on, beneath or over the floor includes releasing the individual selected sensor from the infrastructure sensor holder such that the individual selected sensor either is lowered to the floor, or is lowered towards and hangs over the floor.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the connecting member has a length longer than or equal to a distance between the ceiling and the floor such that the individual selected sensor is lowered to the floor when the individual selected sensor is released from the infrastructure sensor holder, the distance being measured at a corresponding selected location of the floor for deploying the individual selected sensor.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein the connecting member has a length shorter than a distance between the ceiling and the floor such that the individual selected sensor is lowered towards and hangs over the floor when the individual selected sensor is released from the infrastructure sensor holder, the distance being measured at a corresponding selected location of the floor for deploying the individual selected sensor.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein: the plurality of sensors includes one or more selected sensors, an individual selected sensor being arranged to be deployed at a corresponding selected location of the floor for sensing the body of smoke and flame; and the disposing of the plurality of sensors on, beneath or over the floor includes transporting the individual selected sensor to the corresponding selected location of the floor from elsewhere.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the individual selected sensor is aerially transported to the corresponding selected location of the floor by an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV).

8. The method of claim 6 , wherein the individual selected sensor is transported to the corresponding selected location of the floor by a mobile robot.

9. An indoor-fire monitoring system for monitoring progress of a fire in an indoor environment, the indoor environment having a ceiling and a floor, the system comprising: a plurality of sensors for sensing a body of smoke and flame risen near the ceiling, an individual sensor deployed at a selected location of the floor being configured to be responsive to a deployment command by disposing the individual sensor on, beneath or over the floor such that the individual sensor is closer to the floor than to the ceiling and such that a sensing direction of the individual sensor is oriented vertically towards the ceiling, allowing the individual sensor to remotely sense the body of smoke and flame while avoiding the individual sensor to approach or contact the body of smoke and flame; and a computing server communicable with the individual sensor, the computing server being configured to: upon determining that the fire has occurred, immediately deploy the plurality of sensors to sense the body of smoke and flame by executing a deployment process, wherein the deployment process comprises sending the deployment command to the individual sensor, commanding the individual sensor to remotely sense the body of smoke and flame in a vertical direction towards the ceiling to thereby generate a sequence of sensed data measured for the selected location, and commanding the individual sensor to transmit the sequence of sensed data to the computing server; receive a plurality of sensed-data sequences generated from the plurality of sensors at respective selected locations of the floor; and analyze the plurality of sensed-data sequences to determine the states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame over the respective selected locations of the floor, thereby allowing the states and dynamics of the body of smoke and flame to be holistically monitored even at an early stage of the fire;
wherein: the plurality of sensors comprises one or more selected sensors installed beneath the floor with a corresponding sensing direction of an individual selected sensor being oriented vertically towards the ceiling; and
wherein: the individual selected sensor is configured such that when the individual selected sensor receives a corresponding deployment command from the computing server, the individual selected sensor is raised to fully or partially expose the individual selected sensor above the floor for remotely sensing the body of smoke and flame.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein: the individual selected sensor is configured such that when the individual selected sensor receives a corresponding deployment command from the computing server, a protection cover of the individual selected sensor is removed so as to enable the individual selected sensor to remotely sense the body of smoke and flame.

11. The system

Assignees

• Univ Hong Kong Polytechnic

Inventors

• Wang Qixin
• Huang Xinyan
• Shaheer Muhammad
• Mohammad Tamzid
• Zhang Xiaoning
• Luo Mingchun
• Hsu Li-Ta
• Wu Xiqiang
• Xiao Fu
• Usmani Asif

Classifications

• A62C99/009

  Methods or equipment not provided for in groups A62C99/0009 - A62C99/0081 · CPC title

• A62C3/00

  Fire prevention, containment or extinguishing specially adapted for particular objects or places ({in oil wells E21B29/08, A62C35/00; in mines or tunnels E21F5/00} ; for nuclear reactors G21C9/04) · CPC title

• G01K13/00

  Thermometers specially adapted for specific purposes · CPC title

• H04Q9/00 Primary

  Arrangements in telecontrol or telemetry systems for selectively calling a substation from a main station, in which substation desired apparatus is selected for applying a control signal thereto or for obtaining measured values therefrom · CPC title

• G01K2003/145

  Hotspot localization · CPC title