A new 5G camera is being tested to help first responders spot wildfires and reach them before they get out of control.
Fire officials say the first minutes when a fire breaks out is critical to extinguishing the blaze.
“Time spent on any fire, whether it’s a bushfire or a structural fire, whatever it is, means further damage and property damage.”
T-Mobile and the company Pano AI sent their new 5G camera with artificial intelligence near Portland, Oregon, to detect wildfires before they spread.
First responders told us that as technology evolves, they want to grow with it. They are ready to welcome technology that allows them to communicate and locate the start of a fire.
Drones are already being used for cases like this, but technology leaders say that’s not enough. “They usually photograph a smaller area at a time, whereas our camera can see 10 miles at 360 degrees.”
“For faster communication and assembling a response team in a similar way to wildfire to allow us to use mobile aiming devices for better communication of all disasters big,” Cermack said.
T-Mobile says its 5G cameras detect wildfires in minutes instead of traditional methods, which it says take hours. “Forest fires like Bolt Creek, if we could have spotted it two hours earlier, could we have done more to put it out before it got big,” said John Saw, vice president of operations. T-Mobile’s practices on innovative and emerging technologies.