Fire fighters are now better equipped to handle emergencies thanks to a new 70-metre screen that monitors 53,823 buildings across the city…

A new control room was unveiled yesterday by Dubai Civil Defence that is designed to provide safety and fire information across the city in real-time.

The command centre features a huge 70-metre screen monitored by a team of 29 operators working 24-hours a day to keep the city safe.

Linked to 53,823 buildings across Dubai, the security censor and connectivity system will, at first, focus on commercial buildings, airports and ports – with the ability to even monitor ships out at sea – however, there are plans to roll the coverage out to around 90,000 villas across the city by 2019.

Speaking to Gulf News, Major General Rashid Thani Al Matroushi, Director-General of the Dubai Civil Defence said “All the villas in Dubai need to install fire safety equipment such as fire and smoke detectors. We will start advertising for the fire detectors this year until 2019 when all owners must install the device. It will link all Dubai buildings to our command centre for fast response.”

Presently, only 528 homes are linked to the command centre, with smoke and fire detectors that allow the owner to send an SOS directly to the Civil Defence.

Yup, there’s an app for that

An app was launched concurrently with the new initiative designed to be used by building owners to check the status of fire safety equipment and to be able to quickly contact response teams in the event of fire or gas leak emergencies.

Civil Defense are looking to link the new command centre with 66,554 buildings using the new SOS app by the end of this year.

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