A mystery no longer
When the technology was first being adapted for public safety applications a couple of decades ago, thermal imaging had a futuristic mystique about it. However, most of today's fire fighters will tell you there's not much mystery involved - it's now considered another practical tool of the trade.

The Macomb Township Fire Department has gone a step further, by using its thermal cameras to help area law enforcement officers actually solve a minor mystery: "Where did the suspect go?"

The township's two $20,000 imaging devices, which usually are employed for such tasks as locating people who are trapped in smoke-saturated structures, were borrowed and implemented by the Macomb County Sheriff s Department to detect a man hiding from them in a field of brush and deep weeds.

While acknowledging that the cameras normally are used to save victims who cannot be found by fire fighters relying only on their eyesight, Macomb Sheriff Mark Hackel was impressed by the application in criminal detection.

"If it weren't for the thermal cameras, we might not have found him," Hackel said, in reference to a Detroit man who was arrested by deputies on two criminal warrants. The suspect had fled into a field near an apartment complex, in the hope that nighttime darkness and the area's high weed and brush growth would make him virtually invisible.

In fact, said Hackel, hiding nearly worked. "We couldn't find him," he said. "However, we called on (Macomb Township) Chief Ray Ahonen, who works very closely with us."

Township Fire Captain Richard Koss joined the search and used the imaging devices to quickly locate the suspect. "If it weren't for the thermal cameras, we might not have found him," Hackel acknowledged.

The incident was relatively minor even by local community standards, but it proved an important point, according to MAFF Director Michael J. O'Lear, a Macomb Township fire fighter.

"It showed how practical and helpful thermal imaging can be on an everyday basis in a local setting," he said. "A technology that was considered 'space-age' not very long ago is now routinely used by fire departments and police departments.

"The chief operating officer of a major corporation recently compared the increased use of practical applications in thermal imaging to the same development path that Global Positioning System (GPS) technology took over the years.

He said that GPS provides the answer to a simple question: 'Where am I?' and that thermal imaging technology provides the answer to another simple question: 'What's out there?"

"Thermal cameras give fire fighters the abilities to navigate through blinding smoke and to measure heat," for example. "It gives law enforcement the ability to see without light, just as it does for the military and homeland security personnel. The applications in so many areas are almost unlimited.

"But no one is more appreciative of the technology than a person whose life is saved because fire fighters found him or her in a smoke-filled home by using thermal imaging."