Equipment for emergency rescue operations.
Design News.- 1995 .-9, №11.-P. 44.
Equipment for emergency rescue operations.
As noted in Design News magazine, an important task of emergency rescue services and teams is to search for survivors under the rubble of destroyed buildings after earthquakes and other natural disasters, as well as terrorist attacks. In order to save survivors, they must first be found. Recent tragedies and misfortunes in Los Angeles (USA), Seoul (South Korea), Tokyo (Japan), etc. have stimulated the development and production of new technological systems and tools for emergency rescue services. They receive new listening devices, search cameras, and heat-sensitive equipment. One of these new tools is the Search Cam search device from Search Systems(USA). It consists of a 3.6 m long steel telescopic rod with a 36 mm diameter head at one end, which serves as a support for attaching various sensors and search devices (video camera, microphone, loudspeaker and lighting devices). An electric motor mounted in the head enables rescuers to search with a video camera in a 180° C sector. The telescopic rod allows you to penetrate into the rubble formed by reinforced concrete floor slabs to a depth of 3 m in destroyed buildings. The cost of such a device is about $ 1,000. It is becoming a standard tool for 26 emergency rescue teams of the US Federal Emergency Management Association. One such device was purchased by the Seoul Fire Department a month before the collapse of a five-story building there and was successfully used to search for survivors.
Another device TPL-310 by Elpam Electronics(Israel) was developed in response to the increasing number of terrorist attacks. This device uses acoustic and seismic sensors placed in an 80 mm high cylinder, which is lowered into the rubble at the scene of an incident to detect any sounds or signals from people still alive. The TPL-310 uses one acoustic sensor to establish communication with the victims of the disaster and four seismic sensors to detect vibrations caused by people knocking or scratching in the rubble.
A similar device, Life Detector, is offered by Delsar(USA). The device uses a single sensor that responds to acoustic and seismic frequencies, capable of detecting vibrations with a frequency of 1 Hz. Extraneous noise is suppressed by filters, which allows rescuers to more accurately determine the location of victims.
An important life-saving tool that makes the work of emergency rescue teams easier is the Hot Stick device from this company, which warns of the proximity of live lines or AC wires. This device uses a highly sensitive amplifier, the output signal of which triggers an audible or visual alarm when the device approaches a power line. The Hot Stick device is used by emergency rescue teams in buildings destroyed by natural disasters or terrorist attacks.
Emergency rescue teams believe that the most important new technical means for them are those that reduce the time it takes to search for survivors in destroyed buildings.