UC01.1: Health and environmental monitoring (Firefighters)

Last modified by Tjalling Haije on 2025/09/15 09:25

Health and environmental monitoring – Firefighting

Objective	OB03: Improve first responder health through monitoring of physical and mental state OB04: Improve safety by providing overviews and warnings of environment conditions
TDP	TDP3, TDP6, TDP7
IDP	IDP2, IDP4
Actors	Firefighter, Squad Leader, Medic, Safety Officer (described at 4. Personas & Problem Scenarios and Direct Stakeholders)
Pre-Condition	Wearables are active and connected before firefighters enter the danger zone.
Post-Condition	Health alerts handled; intervention performed if needed.
Status	Validated during and refined after CFT 1, CFT 2, CFT 3

Action Sequence

Equipment Check and Deployment
a. Firefighters quickly put on wearable sensors when mission is confirmed
b. Safety officer confirms connectivity before entry.
Live Monitoring in Action
a. Vitals (e.g. heart rate, CO exposure) are tracked during fire suppression.
b. Firefighters receive vibration or LED warnings if thresholds exceeded, but can turn these off when needed
c. Alerts escalate automatically for predefined danger levels.
Remote Oversight and Alerts
a. Safety officer monitors dashboard for all team vitals with simple colour indicators
b. Critical alerts are sent to squad leader.
c. Local health services prepare for immediate support if triggered. In case of a false alarm squad lead is able to cancel it.
Intervention and Team Adjustment
a. Firefighter is pulled out by team if condition worsens.
b. Medic assesses and logs health data.
c. Squad leader adjusts team composition or rest timing.
Post-Incident Reporting
a. System logs are exported for incident review.
b. Health data supports tactical evaluation and accountability.

Claims (title)	Function	Effect(s)	Action Sequence Step(s)
CL1 Decreased physical workload for responders	Health tracking, wearable alert	Reduces physical workload by alerting and preventing overexertion → Measure with responder stress/effort logs or HR trends.	2a, 2b, 2c, 3a
CL2 Improve safety for responders	Monitoring and alerting of toxic gasses Note: is this an envisioned functionality?	Improves safety by reducing (toxic) gas exposure → Measure with FR time near toxic gasses, or with near incident analysis.	2a, 2b, 2c, 3a
CL3 Improve safety via remote escalation	Safety officer monitors team vitals	Improves safety by ensuring safety officers can intervene remotely based on live vitals. → measured as above	3a, 3b
CL4 Decrease physical workload for responders	Safety officer monitors team vitals	Safety officer decreases physical workload by double checking FR status → measured as above	3a
CL5 Improve medical decision-making	Medical triage supported by sensor data	Increases effectiveness and efficiency through informed medical response and appropriate treatment via vitals history. → measure with time for FR treatment and FR time-to-recovery.	4a, 4b
CL6 Improved SA on personnel status for team lead (and command)	Alert escalation, Live dashboard, Auto-alerts	Command has improved SA on health status of personnel → Measure with NASA TLX ?	3a, 3b, 4a
CL7 Support continuous learning with health data for after action review	Health data over time of all first responders is exported (and replayable?) after mission	Lessons learned can be identified and incorporated incorporated effectively → Measure with incorporation in debriefing and training protocols using questionnaire / interview?	5a, 5b
CL8 Improve mission performance	Combination of all functions	Task is completed quicker and with better results due to more efficient use of personnel → Measure with task time, number of extractions avoided, or successful rescues.	all steps