Irish Prison Service benefits from Siemens fire safety upgrade

Operating under the direction of the Department of Justice, the IPS is a crucial element of the criminal justice system. It‘s responsible for the safe and secure custody of individuals who are sentenced to a prison term, held on remand or otherwise detained for immigration-related matters.

As a trusted partner for more than three decades, Siemens has consistently delivered comprehensive fire safety solutions and lifecycle support to this valued customer. That partnership has included the recent completion of a significant upgrade of life safety systems for the IPS by implementing advanced detection systems and the deployment of the Siemens Building X with Fire Manager platform with cloud-enabled capabilities.

New technologies and services have resulted in enhanced operational practices and increased protection for staff and inmates. In addition, the investment in digital services is improving system uptime and enabling data-driven forms of decision-making.

Smart fire safety technologies

The upgrade has been engineered to address the specific demands of the IPS. 

Smart Disturbance Free Testing Sinteso detectors are adept at differentiating between genuine fire sources and deceptive phenomena such as steam or dust, thereby ensuring precise detection and significantly reducing the chances of false alarms.

These intelligent devices also perform regular self-diagnostics, verifying their functionality and maintaining peak performance, with automatic reporting of any issues and analysis of test results, either on-site or remotely.

For the prison environment, this translates to significant practical benefits as the need to access restricted and/or sensitive areas is substantially reduced through remote testing capabilities, while hard-to-reach locations such as high atriums can be managed on a more efficient basis.

Data-driven decisions

In order to facilitate immediate investigation of any fire incident, authorised prison personnel can now monitor the status of any live fire event from any location via the new Sinteso Connect app. This enables rapid situation assessment and early decision-making, including a determination of whether evacuation is necessary and how to best manage a planned and phased evacuation (a particularly important factor given the significant disruption involved in evacuating a prison).

Further efficiencies are being achieved with the introduction of the new automated eLogbook system, which automatically records all fire-related events and interactions. This digital approach eliminates the need for manual logging, providing authorised officers with instant access to comprehensive system records from any device, while also ensuring the accurate and time-stamped documentation of all system activities.

Enabling comprehensive monitoring across multiple prison locations, Siemens has implemented Building X with Fire Manager. This solution provides full visibility of the status of all sites on a single dashboard, offering access to both real-time and historical data.

Designed to support the IPS by delivering greater operational insights, this set-up enhances maintenance planning and reporting.

Customer gains

The IPS is able to take advantage of new corrective and preventive service models alongside continuous system performance monitoring and checks. Remote fault interrogation allows issues to be diagnosed, resolved and restored without always requiring an on-site response.

In those cases where on-site intervention is necessary, engineers arrive fully equipped with detailed system diagnostics and historical data, significantly reducing problem resolution time and improving first-time fix rates.

The integration of smart and self-testing detectors combined with remote servicing capabilities has produced significant operational efficiency gains for the IPS. Automated diagnostics have reduced manual inspections, remote troubleshooting has eliminated unnecessary site visits and real-time performance monitoring is enabling predictive maintenance.

A mandatory Health and Safety protocol means that officers must always escort contractors during service visits, itself a process involving considerable resource. A pilot test has revealed the extent of the efficiency gains: a total of 76 escort days have been saved, enabling valuable time to be redirected towards core security duties. This new approach not only enhances operational efficiency, but also maintains rigorous safety standards, while significantly reducing resource demands placed on security personnel.

Future-proof infrastructure

Rónán Dunning, Governor of Works for the Irish Prison Service, commented: “The integration of new digital systems and services represents not only our commitment to technological excellence, but also our dedication to deliver a sustainable and future-proof safety infrastructure across our organisation.“

Joe Walsh, head of Siemens Smart Infrastructure, responded: “Through our strategic partnership with the Irish Prison Service, we‘ve engineered an holistic fire safety solution that not only addresses multifaceted requirements and supports the complexities of the operational environment, but also delivers measurable outcomes.”

*Further information is available online at www.siemens.co.uk/cerberus