Fire extinguisher presence detection via OpenMV automatic inspection

Whether a fire extinguisher is in place is often only revealed when it is actually needed—by which time it is already too late. Relying on manual inspections results in low frequency and high risk of omissions, making it difficult to achieve continuous and effective monitoring. OpenMV transforms fire safety inspections into an “always-on” process through visual means.

In public and industrial premises such as shopping malls, industrial parks, factory workshops, and office buildings, the proper placement of fire extinguishers—whether they are positioned in accordance with regulations, whether they have been moved without authorisation, and whether they are obstructed by other objects—directly affects the efficiency of emergency response during unexpected fire incidents. Should a fire extinguisher be missing or unavailable for immediate use, the critical window for initial fire suppression is often missed, resulting in greater safety losses.

Traditional fire safety inspections primarily rely on manual periodic checks, which not only limit inspection frequency but also heavily depend on inspectors’ sense of responsibility and experience, making omissions, misjudgments, or situations where “inspections are passed but equipment is subsequently removed” prone to occur, thus hindering the achievement of continuous and effective supervision.

Introducing SingTown’s OpenMV smart camera, which upgrades fire extinguisher inspections from manual patrols to round-the-clock automated visual inspections.

The camera is fixedly deployed at the designated locations corresponding to fire-fighting facilities and operates stably over the long term to continuously capture on-site images of fire extinguisher areas without human intervention. OpenMV runs object recognition algorithms on the camera side to accurately identify fire extinguishers and, in conjunction with pre-defined installation area rules, determines whether they are positioned as required. Additionally, through integrity and occlusion detection, the system can identify whether a fire extinguisher is obstructed, toppled, or exhibits abnormal appearance, thereby assessing its operational readiness from multiple dimensions.

Upon detecting anomalies such as missing fire extinguishers, positional deviations, or obstructions, OpenMV can immediately generate an alert signal at the edge, trigger on-site audible and visual alarm devices, or upload event information to the management platform—achieving true “immediate anomaly detection and instant issue notification.”

Leveraging an edge deployment architecture and on-device AI capabilities, OpenMV can perform recognition and decision-making without continuously uploading video streams, thereby reducing network and storage costs while significantly enhancing system stability and response speed.

Fire inspection has thus been upgraded from “periodic manual inspection” to “7×24-hour online monitoring”, effectively reducing fire safety risks and enhancing overall emergency response capabilities.