CFD’s transmission of videos, through VR headsets that communicate directly to recruits during training, is believed to be the first instance of a fire department using the technology in education. Filmed during a variety of burns, the three videos completed to date are designed for agency use only. Several others are in the works.
“I’d say we’re a leader in the space. To my knowledge, we’re the first in the world to do synchronized 360 real-world fire video for our recruits,” Cosumnes Fire Capt. Kirk McKinzie said, indicating the department has shown footage to 19 students simultaneously.
“A lot of this stuff that we’re doing, I think, will really benefit the new generations that come forward," CFD Deputy Chief for Operations Troy Bair told Techwire. "As the older generation retires, there’s kind of a knowledge gap, an experience gap, if you will. This will help us tie those two things together so that we don’t lose all that knowledge and experience.”
The deployment follows CFD’s Feb. 4 release of its first 360-degree video public service announcement on highway safety, filmed on a GoPro Fusion camera and disseminated in part on 400 donated Google Cardboard devices. Among the takeaways:
• The videos won’t replace actual firefighter training, CFD officials emphasized. Rather, the short films let recruits stay “in the room” where fire happens longer than is humanly possible — and comfortably acclimate to the extreme heat, stress and chaos of an actual blaze.
“That way, when we put them in the can for the first time, they’re not overwhelmed by the heat, the low visibility and all the other things — the stressors that you guys got to experience today,” Jim Bugai, CFD assistant performance and development coordinator for emergency medical services, said at a press event Dec. 12. He referred to the fire “can,” a training facility comprised of multiple shipping containers, where recruits and press in fire gear can study and train with controlled fire.
Firefighter Justin Quarisa, who showed the videos to members of the media, said the headsets give instructors more bandwidth as well, enabling them to communicate with recruits and draw on videos to point out fire and structure features.
“We can show them different things, and they’re actually absorbing that knowledge at a much better rate,” Quarisa said.
• The videos include aerial and ground footage of controlled burns at houses ready for demolition; scenes of a test burn done in 2018, with the Department of Homeland Security and NASA, in support of its AUDREY (Assistant for Understanding Data through Reasoning, Extraction, and sYnthesis) app; and wildfire video from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The headsets offer a 360-degree field of vision that showed viewers floor coverings “off-gassing,” or emitting particles or fumes before bursting into flame; and furniture warping in extreme heat before igniting.
• The initiative, roughly 18 months in development, brings together several entities. CFD filmed the videos on six GoPro cameras, including two newly donated Fusion Max devices. They were edited by UK-based RiVR, which also provides hardware and software; and are shown through 24 headsets from Pico Interactive. Financial support also comes from fire department equipment supplier W.S. Darley & Co.
• CFD’s current class of recruits, which graduates in February, is the first to use the technology. But Battalion Chief Rick Clarke said he’s hopeful it finds a foothold in emergency medicine, fire investigations, law enforcement or community outreach. CFD, which serves the cities of Elk Grove and Galt, is “in talks,” Clarke said, with law enforcement agencies in Elk Grove, Galt, and Sacramento County and city.
“… If we could put people in that true environment, team them up in a virtual world and have them actually have to deal with some of those kinds of things, that could be amazing training for our communities. And the people who want to serve those communities,” Clarke said.
