Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Restarting the movie after a shutdown?

This is topic Restarting the movie after a shutdown? in forum Digital Cinema Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 05-14-2012, 12:38 AM:

Somebody told me a story about their experience at the theater where I used to work. Not knowing the particulars of how digital systems work, I could not adequately answer the question.

This person was watching the movie when one of the kids at the concession stand caught a popper on fire. The fire alarm system shut down all the projectors and they had to dump all of the customers out of all of the theaters.

The fire department came, quenched the fire and pushed the still-smoldering popper out to the parking lot. They gave the all clear in about a half hour but the place had to shut down for the rest of the night because all of the digital projectors had shut down and they couldn't restart them.

The customer told me that they had to raincheck/refund the entire theater. That just sounds funky to me.

Can't these digital systems be restarted after they experience a "less than graceful" shutdown?

When I was working for Cinemark and we had shutdowns due to the fire alarm going off or because of a power failure, I could restart all the film projectors by myself in about ten minutes. If there were two or three guys, we could do it in even less time?

I get the feeling that somebody at that theater doesn't know what they are doing.

What do you think?

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-14-2012, 02:50 AM:

Depends? Before being digital, I had times where an alarm would go off, we'd get the all-clear and it would take forever for our automation to register that the fire department had turned off the alarm (or the guy forgot to change everything back to normal) and we'd have to run manually until everything was normal. And if something like this happened, I'd not be shocked if the digital stuff would fail...

And if they were stupid and didn't use UPS's, some important equipment might've been killed.

Posted by Richard May (Member # 2627) on 05-14-2012, 05:57 AM:

If the fire alarm is hooked up properly, they can be restarted as soon as the alarm is shut. We have a macro set for a fire alarm pulse or latch. It brings the lights up, pauses the movie and shut off the sounds. When it's cleared, we just resume.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 05-14-2012, 05:58 AM:

Odds are it was the automations that were still getting the "Fire Alarm" signal. The projectors and servers could note care less otherwise. Most servers will "wake up" right where the movie stopped if they lost power.

Another issue could have been that the fire alarm was NOT tied into the automation so the movies continued to run during the Fire department's work so they had no good means to restart the movies at the point of the incident. Or...the incident would back up all subsequent shows so it would be better to can them and start up on the next set of shows...or...corporate told them to shut down for the night due to the incident since there was likely damage to the lobby, bad odor...etc...they wanted to assess the appearance of the theatre before reopening to the public.

So many possibilities. However, the digital equipment would have no problem starting up after a fire incident and if the automation is tied into a fire alarm system...the movies could certainly have stopped right on the frame where the problem occurred and be ready for restart.

Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 05-14-2012, 08:37 AM:

It's the same fire alarm system that was in that theater when I was working there. Just a relay closure which kills the projectors. When the alarm is reset, the relays automatically open again.

If you need to, the cut-off circuit can be disabled at the panel if you have the key. It's the same key used to reset the panel. They always used to leave the key in the lock.

Further, if you had to, you could open the back of the projector and pull out the cut-off relays. Not saying anybody actually ever did that. [Wink]

Knowing what I do about that theater, I can guess that they never hooked up the fire alarm relays in the first place. That could explain things.

However, the story that I got said that they couldn't get the projectors restarted again after they tried.

Judging from what you guys are telling me, I think somebody in that theater is telling stories.

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-14-2012, 12:47 PM:

What can happen is that the location digital employees don't know how to clear out the alarm message in the eCNA units after all has been reset.
When this message remains in the eCNA units, it really messes up startup procedures.

Been there and done that a few times, esp when I didn't know the building's alarm went off and was immediately reset due to some location error.

Posted by Joe Elliott (Member # 4006) on 05-14-2012, 06:37 PM:

Several theaters I service have had problems after a fire alarm has gone off where the relays have stuck, in one or several auditoriums. I have had to go and disconnect those screens until the fire alarm company could come and fix it.

Posted by Mark Hajducki (Member # 1732) on 05-15-2012, 12:31 PM:

It would seem sensible to have content running when carrying out the weekly fire alarm test (even if it is just a special playlist containing trailers) to ensure that everything shuts down properly.

This would also allow staff to be trained on how to reset the system after an alarm to reduce issues when public performances are cancelled.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-15-2012, 07:49 PM:

I've never worked anywhere that had weekly fire alarm tests.

Posted by Mark Hajducki (Member # 1732) on 05-16-2012, 10:24 AM:

Weekly fire alarm testing is recommended/required in the UK government Fire Safety Risk Assessment for theatres, cinemas and similar premises guide.

(section 2.6, p63)

quote:
Your ﬁre warning and/or detection system should be supervised by a named responsible person, given enough authority and training to manage all aspects of the routine testing and scrutiny of the system. The control and indicating equipment should be checked at least every 24 hours to ensure there are no speciﬁc faults. All ﬁre warning systems should be tested once a week. For electrical systems a manual call point should be activated (using a different call point for each successive test), usually by inserting a dedicated test key (see Figure 18). This will check that the control equipment is capable of receiving a signal and, in turn, activating the warning alarms. Manual call points may be numbered to ensure they are sequentially tested.

Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 05-16-2012, 01:46 PM:

quote: Monte L Fullmer
What can happen is that the location digital employees don't know how to clear out the alarm message in the eCNA units after all has been reset.
When this message remains in the eCNA units, it really messes up startup procedures.

This makes sense. Of the people I knew when I worked there, many of them still do. From my experience, most of them would not have thought of this. They would have turned the key in the fire alarm to reset the system then hit the "Start" button on the projectors but, when the machines didn't behave as expected, they would have been confused and started to panic.

If the fix would have been as simple as hitting a "reset" button, some place, they would be able to cope. If it required any more thought than that, it would have been a "disaster" they couldn't deal with.

I have fielded many emergency calls from people in situations like this. That's what my experience leads me to believe.

If the company technician received the service call any later than 7:00 or 8:00 in the evening, he would have simply told them that he would be there in the morning.

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-16-2012, 02:42 PM:

Funny is that on the display of the eCNA units, it will have the warning of the Fire Alarm ..

You just scoll over to the right once to see the warning and hit 'cancel', then return to the main program.

Done.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 05-16-2012, 03:08 PM:

Weekly fire alarm tests?!?! That's insane. Doesn't each test require coordination between the alarm company and the fire department? How many firemen spend all day every day dealing with fire alarm tests? This must result in far more test alarms than real ones.

As far as I know, most public places here do these tests once or twice per year. And many older theatres do not even have fire alarm systems (or, if they do, it's a single Gamewell pull box that is connected to the fire department, not a full-blown system with heat sensors and horns and all the rest).

[ 05-16-2012, 05:30 PM: Message edited by: Scott Norwood ]

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-16-2012, 03:41 PM:

We conduct tests, but simply call up the alarm company to allow an hour for tests and disregard the alarm. Then when completed, we call back to re-engage the system.

Thus no fire or police will be notified from the alarm company.

This is how most businesses conducts alarm situations with this protocol: alarm goes off, alarm company calls up the business to verify if it's a mistake, or actual alarm, esp if no one answers the phone.

If it's a mistake, location resets the system and all is good.

No answer, alarm company make the emergency call(s).

-Monte

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 05-16-2012, 03:42 PM:

Ours at work are tested at 7 a.m. every Thursday. I think weekly is about normal.

Posted by Cameron Glendinning (Member # 3516) on 06-03-2012, 12:32 AM:

quote:
Weekly fire alarm tests?!?!

Fire Regulations are taken very seriously in England, I suspect it has a lot to do with terrorism. When I worked in London in the early 1990's random IRA bombings in train stations or public places were a reality. Cinemas were a prime target!

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 06-18-2012, 05:25 PM:

quote: Scott Norwood
Weekly fire alarm tests?!?! That's insane. Doesn't each test require coordination between the alarm company and the fire department?

Not where I worked. I can't remember the details for everywhere, but in the last cinema I worked (1999-2001), the alarm sequence had a phase 1 and a phase 2. Phase 1 was triggered by a break glass, a smoke detector or a rate-of-rise heat detector. It sounded the alarm, sent the stop signal to the projection and house lights system and killed the canned music in the bar and lobby. This lasted for two minutes, during which time the duty manager was supposed to establish whether the alarm was geniune or false, and if false, cancel it and reset the system. If genuine, the alarm was allowed to go in to phase 2, which was a robocall to the fire brigade. During the Friday morning testing we'd unscrew a break glass or light a cigarette under one of the smoke detectors to trigger phase 1, but then reset the system within the two-minute window.