Deploying Eclipse at Your Department

Small enough to secure to a firefighter’s gear and priced to meet the budget of almost any fire department, Eclipse was designed as the first personal-issue thermal imager. The features and resolution of Eclipse make it best suited for navigational and search and rescue uses inside a fire scene.

The innovative technology of Eclipse can dramatically increase the speed with which firefighters can navigate a fire and increase firefighter safety.

There are two important facts to remember when considering Eclipse Thermal Imagers for your department:

•    According to the U.S. Fire Administration, 114 firefighters lost their lives in 2008.  Nearly 18 percent of those firefighters killed on a fire scene died because they became lost, trapped or caught in a structural fire.
•    A crew can only move through a building or room as quickly as the slowest firefighter on the crew.

Because Eclipse is engineered for navigational purposes, it is most effectively used when a team enters a fire with an advanced Bullard Thermal Imager in the lead for analysis and multiple Eclipse Thermal Imagers providing navigation for the following firefighters. Using this deployment model helps counteract the two important facts listed above.

•    By giving thermal ‘sight’ to every firefighter in the fire, each member of the crew can identify doorways, people, obstacles and other elements necessary for safe navigation.
•    With an advanced thermal imager in the lead and Eclipse thermal imagers in a secondary position, all firefighters in the crew can travel at an equal speed and enhance crew accountability.

The advanced thermal imagers from Bullard, like T4 and T3Max, offer features to help firefighters analyze a scene, conduct size-up and investigate. Features such as Electronic Thermal Throttle®, Super Red Hot®, ultra-high resolution and digital zoom give firefighters advanced information on a scene. These advanced thermal imagers are still vital tools for your department. A personal-issue Eclipse, however, plays an important safety role for a crew, increasing the number of ‘eyes’ on the fire in the following ways:
•    Speeding search and rescue
•    Increasing efficiency
•    Enhancing firefighter safety