Texaco Inc.

Katherine L Greenhill

Frank L Lankford, Jr

Winthrop K Brown

Ronald L Campsey

Chew-Chen Lin

A safety system and method, for use with apparatus having a conductive member where the apparatus changes the attitude and/or altitude of the conductive member during the operation of the apparatus, includes an antenna mounted on the conductive member which senses an electric field and provides an AC signal representative of the strength of the electric field. The peaks of the AC signal are averaged over several cycles to provide an average peak signal. A reference signal circuit derives the reference signal from either the average peak signal prior to the change in the member's attitude and/or altitude or while the member's attitude and/or altitude is changing. A control device connected to the averaging circuit and to the reference signal circuit prevents further changing of the conductive member's attitude and/or altitude in accordance with the average peak signal and the reference signal when the electric field strength is greater than a safe value.

Safety monitor means and method

The present invention is an improvement to a station at a remote location from a distant computer which communicates at a predetermined rate prior to said improvement by way of telephone lines. A modem is connected to the telephone line which converts signals carried by the telephone lines to signals suitable for use with a controller and converts signals from a controller to signals suitable to be carried by the telephone lines. There are at least two controllers, each controller is connected to a plurality of terminals. Apparatus connects the modem to the controllers which derives a set of signals for each controller in accordance with the signals from the modem and derives a set of signals for the modem from signals provided by the controllers in a manner so that the remote station communicates with the computer at substantially a predetermined rate.

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Houston, TX, United States of America

Katherine L Greenhill