New partnership for confined space monitoring technology to provide protection for workers in the most hazardous worksites

Blackline Safety Corporation has announced its new partnership with Access Technology Group, a highly innovative company specialising in digital shutdowns and turnarounds, which will see Blackline’s G7 EXO portable area gas monitors combined with Access Technology’s VISICS digital confined space monitoring technology.

According to Brendon Cook, Blackline’s Chief Partnership Officer, “Blackline Safety has over 1,000 customers around the world and through this partnership we are now able to link our equipment and live stream gas readings to the VISICS platform to support the new best practices of confined space monitoring and deliver even more value to our customers”.

Confined spaces have always been potential hazards within an industrial environment and finding the dangers and preventing these hazards from putting personnel and assets at risk has been a major challenge for safety management for many years. Keeping the danger to a minimum involves knowing when there are people in these confined spaces, the presence of any potentially dangerous gases and the length of time sent in this location is crucial.   

Access Technology’s VISICS system retrieves information from personnel’s badges and communication devices to oversee and monitor their time in confined areas. Live camera feeds from inside and outside the confined space allows remote teams to monitor each confined space centrally along with workers’ activities in and outside the area being monitored. 

With the recent integration of the G7 EXO area gas monitors, the instruments communicate directly with the VISICS network; the systems streams gas detection data sampled from confined spaces to add an extra layer of proactive hazardous gas monitoring during turnarounds or shutdowns.

Rene Slegers, Access Technology Group’s CEO is understandably said, “Integrating with Blackline Safety is a wonderful opportunity for VISICS as it allows us to offer Blackline's top-of-the-line technology while maintaining the same familiar look and feel for VISICS operators…. By combining the right people with the best equipment, such as Blackline’s, VISICS helps protect CSE personnel from the risks and hazards associated with confined space work, 24/7.”” 

VISICS are a global market leader in digital confined space monitoring that provides services to most renowned international, industrial energy customers directly or via several well-developed local partnerships. Blackline have worked with Access Technology Group and InfoSignal, their North American partner, to offer their customers an EXO hard-wired data interface that provides real-time gas readings into their VISICS network. The technology has been trialled at several industrial sites to facilitate a seamless integration.