A 16-year-old from Orange County is set to test his wildfire-detecting sensor startup in Irvine.

Ryan Honary, a Newport Beach native studying at Stanford Online High School, has earned several accolades for his work using artificial intelligence to detect wildfires. His startup, SensoRy AI, has already been recognized with an Office of Naval Research (ONR) Naval Science Award and won the grand prize at the 2019 Ignite Innovation Student Challenge.

Honary began developing his technology in fifth grade following the devastating 2018 Camp Fire, which killed 85 people and scorched more than 150,000 acres in Butte County. As a young student, he created early detection technology aimed at preventing wildfires, which later earned a grant and led to the formation of SensoRy AI.

The system uses AI to establish a sensor network that analyzes smoke and heat data to alert firefighters when a fire breaks out.

“We can detect a fire as small as one foot with a line of sight over 1,200 feet and around 300 feet of non-line of sight,” Honary explained.

The Orange County Fire Authority is now supporting him, helping to turn his platform into a deployable product, according to his website. Since launching SensoRy AI, Honary has also secured funding from Irvine Ranch Conservancy for his project.

For more information on Honary and SensoRy AI, click here.