VIDEO: The next wildfire in Boulder County might first be spotted by artificial intelligence.
The Boulder County Sheriff's Office brought two new wildfire lookout cameras online Tuesday morning, and a third will be installed later this month.
The cameras provide a continuous 360 video feed, but it won't be humans behind the lens. It will be artificial intelligence (AI). A computer program trained to recognize signs of trouble will monitor the feeds 24/7. “And what it’s looking for is texture, movement, gradient, and it’s trying to pick up smoke starts,” said Arvind Satyam, Chief Commercial Officer of Pano, the company that designed the software. "We're using computer vision to stitch a full 360 panoramic image, and that does not exist elsewhere in the industry right now."
Satyam said the Pano AI cameras will give firefighters a least 10 minutes of extra lead time, and in some cases could mean more than an hour of saved time.