VOLUME SENSOR: DATA FUSION-BASED, MULTI-SENSOR SYSTEM FOR ADVANCED DAMAGE CONTROL

• US 20080036593A1
• Filed: 08/03/2007
• Published: 02/14/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 08/04/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: The Government Of The United States Of America, As Represented By The Secretary Of The Navy
• Original Assignee: The Government Of The United States Of America, As Represented By The Secretary Of The Navy
• Inventors: Gottuk, Daniel, Steinhurst, Daniel, Minor, Christian, Owrutsky, Jeffrey, Wales, Stephen, Rose-Pehrsson, Susan, Williams, Frederick
• Application Number:
  US11/833,753
• Publication Number:
  US 20080036593A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 340/540
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 17/00 Fire alarms; Alarms responsive to explosion
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 25/00 Alarm systems in which the location of the alarm condition is signalled to a central station, e.g. fire or police telegraphic systems
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 25/002 Generating a prealarm to the central station
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 29/188 Data fusion; cooperative systems, e.g. voting among different detectors

Abstract

Provided a system and method for detecting an event while discriminating against false alarms in a monitored space using at least one sensor suite to acquire signals, transmitting the signals to a sensor system device where the signal is processed into data packets, transmitting the data packets to a data fusion device, where the data packets are aggregated and algorithmic data fusion analysis is performed to generate threat level information. The threat level information is distributed to a supervisory control system where an alarm level can be generated when predetermined criteria are met to indicate the occurrence of an event in the monitored space.

Claims

1. A method for detecting an event while discriminating against false alarms in a monitored space comprising the steps of:

providing at least one sensor suite in said monitored space,

acquiring at least one signal from said sensor suite;

transmitting said signal to at least one sensor system device;

processing said signal into data packets;

transmitting said data packets to a data fusion device;

aggregating said data packets and performing algorithmic data fusion analysis to generate threat level information;

distributing said threat level information to a supervisory control system; and

generating an alarm level when predetermined criteria are met to indicate the occurrence of an event in the monitored space.

2. A method as in claim 1, wherein the monitored space is in a ship.

3. A method as in claim 1, wherein said data packets comprise sensor data and sensor algorithm information.

4. A method as in claim 1, wherein said sensor suite comprising at least one optical sensor, at least one microphone, at least one near-infra-red camera and at least one visible spectrum camera.

5. A method as in claim 1, further comprising a plurality of sensor suites positioned in a plurality of locations.

6. A method as in claim 1, wherein said detected event is a flaming fire, a smoldering fire, a pipe rupture, a flooding event, or a gas release event.