90% of fire deaths in New Zealand happen in peoples' homes.Most people completely underestimate how fast fire travels. You have a very limited time to escape, not 10-15 minutes as most people think – more like 30 seconds before you are overcome with smoke and the fire is beyond your control. You don't even have time to fill a bucket of water.The objective of the communication was simple – educate New Zealanders about the speed at which fire travels.

After training with the NZ Fire Service and witnessing the devastating speed of fire, the media team left with a simple thought: the time it takes a fire to reach capacity is directly comparable with a currency we deal in everyday – the three minute commercial break.It was the media team’s idea to give consumers a relative time frame for the speed of fire by using the length of a commercial break to demonstrate it in real-time. Only media could meet the challenge of communicating the passing of time and we did it by using an existing medium in a unique way.

Because most people underestimate the speed at which a fire can engulf a house, we gave New Zealanders a direct time comparison for the speed of fire. A fire takes three minutes to turn into an inferno; a typical television commercial break is three minutes long.

In a media first, we scheduled six executions, timed perfectly within a break using a real-time clock to show the passing of time as the fire progressed - from ignition to destruction.In special negotiations with the networks we ensured the placement of specific duration commercials between our communications to accurately portray the passing of time.The result is breathtaking.