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Sandia Technology logo A quarterly research and development magazine.

Winter 2006/2007
Volume 8, No. 4

SANDIA TECHNOLOGY

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Detect-to-warn system offers lifesaving capability

ballfield
Baseball fans cheering on their beloved Oakland A’s in a summer homestand may have been happy about the team’s play, but the best news for those visitors to McAfee Coliseum didn’t take place on the field and couldn’t be noticed by even the most observant spectators.

detection system
Chemical detection system can detect chemical warfare agents as well as common toxic chemicals.
Through late June and early July, researchers from Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore, California — roughly 30 minutes east of the A’s home at McAfee Coliseum — tested the Sensing Nodes Informing and Facilitating Fast Emergency Response (SNIFFER) during a series of games. The system, which can be packaged and deployed locally within 24 hours, was developed for the Department of Homeland Security and is designed to provide swift yet effective protection at high-profile events.

The research verdict: “It was very clean based on what we were expecting,” said Ben Wu, a chemical engineer at Sandia who serves as project manager for SNIFFER.

SNIFFER is designed to provide broad, high-confidence coverage of more than 40 different chemicals using multiple overlapping detection technologies and live video. “The beauty of this system is that it can be packaged and set up at a venue within a day’s notice, without having to sacrifice any of the robustness or features required by such a sophisticated system,” said Wu. “The bottom line is that it can help emergency responders save more lives in the event of a terrorist attack.”

SNIFFER can detect a variety of chemical warfare agents as well as the more common toxic industrial chemicals. The SNIFFER platform will also readily accept other types of detectors, such as those that sense radiological material. As a “detect-to-warn” system, said Wu, the aim of SNIFFER is to alert emergency responders to a chemical release early on and enable evacuations or other timely response measures to minimize casualties.