It looks like a mini mountain range rising from the prairie northeast of Denver. It's total area is 53 square miles, twice the size of Manhattan. There were 110 million cubic yards of earth moved. The project attracted interest from people around the world; both detractors and supporters. Many of the local people thought the project would never be completed. It was one of the most ambitious of its type in the world; The Denver International Airport. Which it took several years and several billion dollars more than initially budgeted, it opened in February 1995 and is recognized as stat-of-the-art.

Many construction techniques were new and will probably be used as lessons, both good and bad, for builders of this type of facility throughout the world. Many of the processes and components used were untried. The baggage handling system is probably the most publicized example of the things that can go wrong in such a major undertaking. However, the fire detection system chosen to protect this vital artery has been successfully proven for more than 55 years. The system chosen to protect the tunnels through which baggage and critical facilities support flows is a Protectowire Linear Heat and Fire Detection System.

Protectowire is a fixed temperature Linear Heat Detector. One might think of it as an infinite spot detector. Every centimeter of its length can detect an report an overheat or fire. The Linear Detector was installed on load-bearing stainless steel messenger wire mounted in standoffs on either side of the tunnels - a total of over 3 miles of detector. The Protectowire system is able to pinpoint the exact location of an overheat and convert this location into footage. This in turn reports to the total facilities management system where the problem can be identified and handled.


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