Northern Lakes ringing doorbells for fire help

The Northern Lakes Fire District is employing a new weapon in its fight against fires: your doorbell.

The district has joined up with the popular video doorbell manufacturer Ring to join its Neighbors program, which — aside from providing updates from the fire department — also enables users to share video to help firefighters battle blazes.

“Really for us, it’s an avenue to reach out when we do have an emergency that occurs in a neighborhood,” fire marshal Tyler Drechsel said. “The [Neighbors] program allows us to reach out if there’s a hazardous condition or a change in your area.”

The program enables users who opt in to share video footage of nearby fires: A computer-generated map overlay at the station displays all participating users and can instantly send video footage, helping inbound firefighters get a better idea of what dangers await them.

“If we have a structure fire, for example, we could request through Ring for any video they have on it,” Drechsel said. “We could look at it from a training aspect, as well: It might give us an idea for how long a fire has been burning, or even where it might have started. It could help us assess where to access the fire.”

Drechsel said the service could also help his engines pinpoint fire locations. He added that the video technology could also help fire investigators gather evidence of arsons, such as the Hayden View fires of 2015.

“If we have another situation like we had five or six years ago, where we had an arsonist set 30 or so fires,” Drecshel said, "today we could gather the nearby video much quicker with this program. In a situation like that, we can reach out to anyone that has footage, and we can access it a lot quicker.”

Interested Ring owners can volunteer by downloading the Neighbors by Ring app.

“It’s just a good opportunity for us to get some information we wouldn’t otherwise have,” Drechsel said.