I used to live here. There's 132 flats. Those flats contain 132 heat detectors, 264 smoke detectors and 264 sounders. Please explain how a #WakingWatch with two eyes, a nose and an air horn gives better early detection and warning? Just connect them all to a centralised system. 
If you're wondering what a good fire alarm looks like in a block of flats, this will explain. Fire officers tend to think about offices when you mention fire alarms & wouldn't be aware of the smart systems now available for flats. GB tech, made in GB.
If talking about the costs of #WakingWatch, NFCC tell us, it's for early detection & warning. Pre-existing costs of this, for residents, already include their domestic smoke detection/alarm system & if the block has AOVs there'll be smoke detectors for them in communal areas too.
I was enthused when I discovered a UK manufacturer producing this tech especially for blocks of flat, improving detection & reliability while removing false fire calls, I went googling them. I found this, by their MD, about why they invented it & #StayPut c-tec.com/news/product-n…
One of the serious points made in the film is about the inadequacy of typical domestic smoke alarms. Their pitch & sounds do not wake a whole range of people for a range of reasons. The commercial hardware in the Grade C system deals solves this problem. iafss.org/publications/f…
One reason given for not allowing integrated detection systems in blocks of flats is that false alarms cause desensitisation, causing people not to evacuate. Firstly, only a faulty or badly specified system has false alarms, millions of systems dont. Also: citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/downlo…
There's also little truth any more in the assumption that either: alarms will cause excessive fire brigade call outs, or that everybody will keep getting evacuated. Intelligent systems sounds alert only who and where you tell them to, 1/
2/ You can set it to:
- only go off in the flat where a smoke detector goes off or
- to go off in neighbours flats only when two heads are activated in the same flat or
- to go off on the floor and the above floor if smoke/fire is detected in two separate flats. And ...
- only go off in the flat where a smoke detector goes off or
- to go off in neighbours flats only when two heads are activated in the same flat or
- to go off on the floor and the above floor if smoke/fire is detected in two separate flats. And ...
3/ You programme the system to only contact the fire brigade given the conditions you tell it, such as: one detector activating, two, detectors in separate compartments simultaneously activating, or even only when adjacent floors have activations. Complete, total, flexibility.
These photos are of inside Torre Ámbar, Calle de Dulce Chacón, 17, Madrid, where the cladding fire was at the weekend. The building evacuated successfully, everybody got out, nobody was hurt - how do you suppose they achieved that? .@team_greenhalgh
