Home Technical Safetytech Accelerator announced collaboration to improve real-time detection of potential fires below...

Safetytech Accelerator announced collaboration to improve real-time detection of potential fires below deck


Safetytech Accelerator is delighted to announce a collaboration with Seaspan, and selects Everactive technology in a bid to improve real-time detection of potential fires below deck.

The challenge

Allianz predicted that fire and explosion are the biggest safety threats for the Marine and Shipping sector. This trend continues in an era when ships are larger and moving more containers than ever.

Most container ships use smoke detection systems where air is continuously sucked through pipes and directed to a detector in the below deck cargo hold. Once smoke reaches the detector, an alarm is triggered, and the pipes automatically release CO2.

The primary challenge is that it is slow – by the time the smoke reaches the detector the conditions are too hostile for crew to enter the hold. Secondly, spraying CO2 into the hatch may not actually be effective in tackling the fire within a container.

A possible solution

This possible solution could prevent potential fires by early detection of slight increases in a container’s temperature. This can enable smaller issues to be resolved before they become dangerous – providing cost savings and protecting people and assets.

Everactive – a technology company which produces category-defining batteryless and wireless sensors to generate a new class of data for the analytics of the future Industrial IoT, was chosen after a highly competitive Safetytech Accelerator selection process. Their solution is a battery-less and always on, which enables dense wireless sensor networks that can continuously monitor cargo holds in order to detect fires before they can cause catastrophic damage.

Maurizio Pilu, Managing Director of Safetytech Accelerator had this to say about the collaboration, “Battery-less sensor networks could disrupt safety and risk management shipping and other sectors, and fire detection is perhaps one of the most important applications. I’m delighted that we will be working with Seaspan and Everactive on this pilot.”

This pilot will benefit from support from Lloyd’s Register’s Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis which will model airflow and help define the density and placement of sensors.

Pilu added, “The use of LR’s CFD for sensor planning is key for the success of this project and exemplifies the highly-specialized expertise Safetytech Accelerator can draw from when working on difficult technical challenges.”
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