Caterpillar launches 24/7 monitoring service

395 Caterpillar has launched a 24/7 equipment operator monitoring service to provide customers with the power to see, mitigate and manage the primary variable effect on their operations, the human factor.

Through in-cab and wearable safety technologies, Caterpillar says it can now provide customers with visibility to both machine and operator information.

Inside Caterpillar’s 24/7 Monitoring Centre, analysts correlate data about the health and productivity of operators and equipment to reveal the magnitude of conditions such as fatigue and distraction and their impact on operations.

“Our customers want better visibility to the interaction between operators and machines, and how behaviour impacts safety and productivity,” says Tim Crane, Caterpillar safety services manager.

“This innovative solution offers our customers the opportunity to mitigate risk and improve productivity.”

Caterpillar’s solution utilises leading technologies to gain visibility to risk. The Driver Safety System (DSS), developed by 8224 Seeing Machines, an alliance partner of Caterpillar, includes an in-cab camera and alert system to notify the operator the moment a fatigue or distraction event occurs. Events are tracked by analysts who also capture operator sleep quantity and quality information provided through the wrist-worn Cat Smartband, an actigraphy solution powered by Fatigue Science.

The DSS and Cat Smartband are part of a growing suite of tools that assist customers in improving safety by recognising that some risks are natural, inevitable and fully manageable, if made visible. Combined with Cat machine data available through EMSolutions, Cat MineStar System and Cat Vital Information Management System (VIMS), operator performance data from the DSS and Smartband paints a powerful picture of fatigue and distraction risk and its impact on productivity and profitability. Property damage, increased fuel burn and tyre abuse have all been linked to fatigued or distracted operators.