When a large aerospace manufacturer acquired gas detectors to protect against hazardous leaks, it decided to leverage its Metis Secure Emergency Notification and Communications System. The company already relied on the multi-purpose Metis Secure system for overall plant emergency notification and two-way emergency communications, and knew the system was designed to easily integrate with other security and life safety systems.

Typical gas detectors are single-purpose devices that set off sirens, horns, and/or strobe lights in the immediate location of the event, if the volume of hazardous gas in the air rises to a certain level. For the manufacturer, this type of localized notification posed an unacceptable risk to the people working at the 250,000 square foot facility. The company needed a way to alert everyone in the plant, and make sure they quickly evacuated in a gas leak emergency.

Safeguarding the environment was also a factor. The company has many systems in place to prevent hazmat incidents from occurring in the first place. However, should prevention fail, response speed can make the difference between a small, contained incident and environmental disaster. The Metis Secure system automatically alerts specialized plant personnel in case of a leak, and enables them to address potential hazmat incidents with maximum speed.

Metis Secure’s Emergency Help Stations have I/O functionality that enabled the new gas detection sensors to be easily tied into the Metis Secure emergency communications and notification system — so the system will now automatically alert and evacuate the plant if the sensor detects a gas emergency.

If the gas sensor detects that gas in the air has crossed a predetermined threshold, Metis Secure Emergency Help Stations alert everyone in the facility and direct them to designated evacuation points, using a combination of sirens, strobes, clear prerecorded voice instruction, and on-screen text instruction. Multiple alerting modes help ensure that everyone is notified, even in a noisy manufacturing environment where people are wearing hearing protection. The Metis Secure system also ties into the plant’s public address system, to further extend the alerts.

Although the system is set up to alarm automatically, security and safety personnel have the option to cancel alerts with a few clicks from Metis Secure’s easy-to-use, map-based software.

In cases of extreme weather or other emergencies, emergency and plant managers can also manually send alerts and instructions to targeted areas or to the entire plant simultaneously. In addition, a person in need can press the help button on any of the two-way help stations installed throughout the facility to reach security and alert the plant’s medical and safety teams. And, the system is fully supervised, so system operators are alerted in the case of power outages or tamper issues.