Pictured: Carlton Ellis

A carpenter from Lincolnshire who was inspired to become a fire fighter after the September 11 attacks has invented a new piece of technology which he hopes will save thousands of lives.

Carlton Ellis, 50, from Sleaford, who was celebrating his 40th birthday on the day the tragedy happened, joined Lincolnshire Fire and Rescue as a retained fire fighter in 2003.

Since leaving the service he's used the experience he gained working as a fire fighter and a carpenter for 33 years to develop ellivation technology or elli for short.

Carlton is now developing a range of furniture incorporating elli which consists of four individual parts which can be repeatedly taken apart and reassembled.

The first product in the range is elli skirt - the world's first fully mobile multi-functioning skirting board system.

Elli skirt incorporates a cable and wiring storage facility so users can position their electrical items anywhere in their home or office without having to trail wires or overload sockets which can be extremely dangerous.

Carlton explained: "Skirting board has been in existence for the last 300 years but it's not really evolved much since then. It's always played a protective role, protecting our walls from erosion, and without it the plaster would be destroyed in a matter of months.

"Therefore anything we do to the skirting board to make it perform better ultimately gives us greater protection. Elli skirt not only protects our walls but also protects people as it keeps wires and cables concealed, thereby preventing trips and falls and even fires caused by the misuse of cables."

Elli skirt can also be taken apart and removed it from the wall altogether which makes cleaning, decorating walls or laying floors a lot easier. And rather than having to sand it down and paint it, elli skirt can be covered with a range of interchangeable coloured and patterned vinyls.

All this means less dust and therefore fewer dust mites in the home which is good news for the UK's 5.4m asthma sufferers.

"Every year in the UK almost 4,000 people die in accidents in the home and 2.7 million turn up at accident and emergency departments seeking treatment while three people die of asthma every day," explained Carlton.

"Over the next ten years elli could save thousands of lives globally and at the very least ease the pressure on our increasingly overstretched accident and emergency departments."

As well as protecting human life elli is kind to the environment as the synthetic and organic parts can be separated and recycled, creating zero landfill.