Beach security

360 Vision Technology’s Invictus ruggedised Hybrid PTZ cameras are being used to protect endangered nesting green sea turtles. The Invictus camera has been deployed as part of Security Centres International’s high-performance Mobile Advanced Safety Tower (MAST), rapid deployment camera solution, which is now installed on the Cayman Islands, British West Indies. Mobile Advanced Safety Tower The MAST unit was deployed after a funding campaign led by Caymanian, Michael Ridley, to install video surveillance at a key nesting beach at Sand Hole Road in Boatswains Bay. “Sand Hole Road is a critically important nesting beach for the female turtles, who crawl out onto the beaches to dig nests and lay eggs during the night,” Michael explains. We are all very confident that the data obtained from this project will prove invaluable " “Unfortunately, poaching poses a constant threat to the survival of the nesting sea turtles at many locations. In addition, economic development of the island has seen more beach front property being built and a subsequent squeeze on places available for the turtles to nest safely after migrating long distances between feeding grounds.” HD surveillance imaging He adds, “After analysing the Cayman Islands Department of Environment (DoE) detailed nesting data accumulated over 20 years, to identify the most vibrant turtle nesting grounds, I selected the beach to implement a pilot program to monitor nesting turtles and protect them from poaching activity. The beach site has been dubbed, ‘Turtle Beach’ and provides a perfect nesting ground for turtles due to its minimal property development, zero light pollution, and enough sand and vegetation to support the turtles’ nesting activity.” “The Invictus based MAST solution was perfect for the application at the beach,” says Stuart Bostock, Executive Group President at Security Centres International. “Featuring world-class HD surveillance imaging from the 360 Vision Invictus camera, leading-edge design, robust build, zero infrastructure requirements and seamless Video Management System (VMS) integration, MAST is the only product of its kind. It’s also 100% self-powered, using solar energy and a 100-hour back-up battery; a feature supported by the use of the low power requirements of the 360 Vision Invictus camera.” High-performance CCTV surveillance Monitored 24/7, images from the camera enable DoE and Royal Cayman Islands Police Service (RCIPS) officers to be alerted and dispatched when nesting turtles arrive at the beach, assisting the DoE to monitor the beach and provide the highest level of protection against poaching. “We are all very confident that the data obtained from this project will prove invaluable in assisting the DoE with their conservation efforts and assist them with their Island-wide monitoring efforts,” says Michael. “Sand Hole Road is a critically important nesting beach with poaching posing a constant threat to the survival of the sea turtles that nest there, so high-performance CCTV via the MAST solution was specified as the best way to protect them.” Night-time surveillance The MAST system was selected for deployment on the beach due to its excellent night-time surveillance capability The MAST system was selected for deployment on the beach due to its excellent night-time surveillance capability, operating without the need for any supporting local infrastructure. Plus, the MAST system is silent in operation, posing no environmental impact, and thanks to the 360 Vision IR LED illuminator equipped Invictus camera, the system can operate without a visible light source that may disturb, or draw unwanted attention to the turtles nesting site. Mark Rees, Managing Director at 360 Vision Technology added “The Invictus is a high-performance, ruggedised all-in-one PTZ camera with full 1080P HD and Predator ultra-low-light camera technology, making it the perfect choice for off-grid temporary/rapid deployment mobile surveillance rigs, such as MAST. Additionally, Invictus’ low-power consumption greatly assists the longevity of critical off-grid battery power when deployed in remote applications, extending MAST’s operational performance, and meaning fewer maintenance visits to the camera, with the benefit of less disturbance to the green sea turtles.” Video evidence gathering “The Invictus camera’s unparalleled mix of competitive cost and advanced functionality make it the perfect imaging component for the innovative MAST system, where it is now providing much needed surveillance protection and research video.” To date, the use of the MAST unit has proved a huge success in protecting the sea turtles from poachers and providing evidential video of the turtles’ feeding and nesting activity on the beach. Calculating population, nesting patterns and survival rates from the footage gained during this season, plans have already been made for additional protection measures and the extension of the MAST based surveillance program to other locations on the British West Indies island.

Perched on a beautiful peninsula just 7 nautical miles north-east of Sydney, Australia, lies the suburb of Manly. When Captain Arthur Philips, founder of the settlement of Sydney, first visited the area, he was apparently so impressed by the self-assured and manly behaviour of the local Aborigines that he named it Manly Cove, whence present day Manly derives its name. A mere stone’s throw from the central business district, and with the stunning Northern Beaches region on its doorstep, this coastal municipality boasts a perfect combination of world-class surfing, heritage buildings, and a vibrant and bustling town centre. It is a highly attractive residential location and tourist destination alike, welcoming around 6 million visitors each year. Famous for all the wrong reasons However, in recent times, Manly had become famous for all the wrong reasons. The lively entertainment precinct is somewhat of a social hub, not only for locals, but also for holidaymakers, backpackers, and young people from the surrounding areas. In 2007, serious concerns about increasing levels of anti-social and violent behaviour, much of it alcohol-related, led Manly Municipal Council to install CCTV. After close consultation with the local police force to identify trouble spots, the reins were handed over to the council’s IT department who then developed the system. There are now more than 100 MOBOTIX cameras in place throughout the suburb. In a coastal area such as this, it would be simple to also monitor remote areas thanks to the MOBOTIX MxActivity Sensor firmware, which comes standard with every camera from the 4.1.6 firmware upwards. In a coastal area such as this, it would be simple to also monitor remote areas thanks to the MOBOTIX MxActivity Sensor firmware The low energy consumption and minimal bandwidth load of MOBOTIX cameras means that Ethernet cabling is usually all that is required to create a network and supply power, but  the Manly site was too large for such a solution. Instead fibre optic cable was laid to carry data back to the main NAS storage and PoE was provided by means of power injectors, mainly using lightpoles as an energy source. Wherever several cameras were installed in close proximity to one another, airbridges created a network between them, meaning a single fibre optic cable could carry signals from several devices. A large network "The main reason we chose MOBOTIX,” explains Kevin Shea, Systems Administrator at Manly Council, "is because the cameras needed to be able to withstand extreme conditions, such as high temperatures, torrential rain storms and the damaging salt air. And, because we are a government agency, we were also looking for an economical solution which could offer excellent image quality in all light and weather." MOBOTIX has delivered on all counts. Larger, high quality images are recorded using fewer cameras than traditional video solutions, and 7 years on, the cameras have proved to be extremely low maintenance and robust. Managing such a large surveillance operation is simplified with MOBOTIX MxControlCenter (MxCC) video management software. Its user-friendly interface makes controlling and configuring cameras easy and offers a myriad of sophisticated post-processing and analysis possibilities, including MxCC’s time search facility. In just a few clicks footage from one, or several, cameras can be found and viewed. More importantly, the timeserver synchronisation used to achieve this meets court standards, so that the footage can be used as evidence and the superior quality of the high-resolution images maximises the chances of positive identification. MOBOTIX technology has not only helped make the streets of Manly safer, it has also played a significant role in promoting the positives about the town Beyond the call of duty MOBOTIX technology has not only helped make the streets of Manly safer, it has also played a significant role in promoting the positives about the town. The high quality recordings have been used to market a diverse array of events, including the Christmas carols and the Hurley Australian Open of Surfing (AOS). Widely hailed as the birthplace of Australian surfing after Duke Kahanamoku of Hawaii brought his famous surfing exhibition to Manly in the summer of 1914/15, the AOS has really put the town on the international surfing map. Modelled on the famous US Open of Surfing in Huntingdon, California, the festival of surfing, art, music, fashion, and skateboarding attracts upwards of 100,000 visitors and is a major highlight of the local calendar. “Constructing the festival site takes around 10 days, so we use the cameras to keep an eye on things whilst it is being built,” Kevin explains. “Also,” he adds further, “this year we gave the footage to the surfing festival promoters, who used it to make a time-lapse film of the construction.” A MOBOTIX camera is also keeping Manly’s tiniest residents safe from harm, watching over the only breeding colony of the endangered Little Penguin to be found on the NSW mainland. Conclusion Manly council have successfully implemented and managed a large-scale CCTV operation. Easy to install and configure, and low maintenance, the solution has been both economical and capable of weathering the harsh outdoor environmental conditions. MOBOTIX technology has played an important role in making Manly safer, and in protecting and promoting all that makes the place so special.

TV cameras don’t work at night, and night is when users need cameras the most. Police officials in Newport Beach, California found this out and came to FLIR for the solution. One of the most exclusive communities in the country, Newport Beach is home to movie stars, industrialists and entrepreneurs. Befitting its exclusivity, the beach closes to the public each night. Once the sun goes down, however, groups of young people flock to the beach, creating disturbances and disrupting the citizens’ lives in Newport Beach. To counter this nighttime mischief and keep the residents safe, Newport Beach Police Department (NBPD) officers patrolled the beach every Thursday through Sunday evening. This cost the Department thousands of dollars a month and kept officers from patrolling other areas of town. The assessment In early 2007, the NBPD started looking into a technological solution to this problem: video beach surveillance. After initial discussions with Jay Gill of Bassett Sales, a local security camera representative, NBPD IT manager Tom Encheff realised that neither daylight nor infrared illuminated cameras would be up to the job. Illuminating the beach was not a viable option, as the lighting infrastructure alone would cost millions of dollars. Not to mention the resulting glare, this would be offensive to residents and visitors alike. Gill saw the solution right away, telling Encheff, “You need to go thermal.” Thermal security cameras – the right solution Thermal security cameras make pictures from heat, not light, detecting the tiny differences in heat energy that are around us all the time. Day and night, in good weather and bad, everything emits thermal energy. What’s more, the hotter something is the more thermal energy it gives off. FLIR’s thermal security cameras take this energy in and make pictures that look like black and white TV video. Thermal energy is part of a continuum of energy called the electromagnetic (EM) spectrum. The EM spectrum includes gamma rays, X-rays, ultraviolet, visible light, infrared, microwaves, and radio waves. The only part of the EM spectrum that we can see is the small band of energy called “visible light.” Visible light reflects off objects, our eyes sense it, our brains interpret it, and we experience that as sight. Household cameras and camcorders work the same way: they detect reflected visible light and their electronics create pictures. Thermal security cameras, on the other hand, sense and create images from emitted heat energy. FLIR thermal security allows policeofficers to see beach gatherings, evenin the dark of night Because most things generate heat, thermal cameras can see as well at night as during the day. Visible light detectors (like our eyes) don’t work well at night without the help of lights. FLIR’s thermal security cameras don’t have this shortcoming. Financially viable solution NBPD officers were familiar with thermal imaging; their helicopters fly with FLIRs every night. They were not aware, however, that thermal security cameras make a financially viable solution for beach surveillance. Once NBPD officers experienced how FLIR cameras let them see at night, they were sold on the concept and the solution. In June 2007 FLIR partners Bassett Sales and Thompson Engineering installed seven thermal security cameras in Newport Beach. The NBPD chose five SR-19 fixed cameras, one fixed SR-100 and one PTZ-50 MS. This mix of cameras let NBPD keep an eye on large areas of beachfront around the clock. What’s more, the SR-100 long-range camera lets them cover areas they thought would go unobserved. Once they saw the camera’s range performance and image quality, they decided to include its capabilities in their surveillance program. The combination of cameras let the NBPD design a security net with overlapping imaging zones. The PTZ-50MS in particular gives watch standers flexibility in responding to alarms, using a pan/tilt/zoom camera to back-up their fixed cameras. The video from all seven cameras is transmitted to the Department’s command and dispatch centres. There, motion detection software monitors the incoming video and alerts watch standers to activity on the beaches. When someone trips an alarm, commanders can evaluate the intrusion and decide if they need a patrol officer to respond. This allows NBPD to keep its officers on citywide patrol, saving money and using resources more efficiently. The result Installing FLIR thermal security cameras allows the NBPD to cover the beach thoroughly at night, responding more effectively than ever before. Officers previously assigned to beach patrol are now free to cover inland sectors, saving the city money while providing better police services to the public. The Newport Beach Police Department has seen for themselves that FLIR’s thermal security cameras work better at night than any other imaging technology just when they are needed the most.

Under normal conditions, the audible distances of the A141 siren from E2S can reach over 1km Chesil Beach is located in Dorset, South Coast of England. The shingle beach is approximately 14 miles long and it is part of the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site. The Chiswell settlement and the southern neck of Chesil Beach have been flooded many times and this is well documented. Many sea defence systems and flood drainages have been constructed at the Portland end of the Chesil Beach to try to alleviate the overtopping and flooding problems. In addition to sea and flood defences, the Environment Agency replaced their legacy sirens with wide area disaster warning sirens designed and manufactured in the UK by E2S Warning Signals in London. The sirens are sited at intervals through the community. The alarm sirens are intended to warn local residents and individuals present on the beach and nearby towns of a real danger of flooding so that evacuation can take place. In some locations people are advised to stay indoors when they hear the siren as waves come over the beach and sweep through the town. "Working closely with the Environment Agency we were pleased to be able to put forward a bespoke siren system to create an effective warning system that will help to save lives" The location is particularly demanding due to the high background noise levels, the extremely exposed position and the high potential for risk to life. In stormy conditions, the noise of the waves, wind and moving shingle is very loud at this location. Responding to these challenges, E2S teams worked closely with the Environment Agency to ensure a suitable solution was found. The E2S sirens were sounded on five occasions in January and February 2014. On each sounding the equipment worked well, and was effective in that members of the public, who were putting their lives at whilst risk standing on the sea wall, were seen to retreat very quickly when the sirens were operated. The alarm sirens can be initiated either remotely from the Environment Agency’s incident room via the web, from the Environment Agency’s lookout post in the village by radio or independently using a key at each installation. There were many factors to take into account when choosing the right sirens including reliability, ruggedness and flexibility of operation. Under normal conditions, the audible distances of the A141 siren from E2S can reach over 1km. Neal Porter, E2S, Sales & Marketing Director comments, “Working closely with the Environment Agency we were pleased to be able to put forward a bespoke siren system to create an effective warning system that will help to save lives.”

The client has integrated ACT access control devices into its IP network, which communicates across two bridges An access control solution from Access Control Technology (ACT) is being used on the main crossing points between England and South Wales. The two bridge crossings are the (suspension) Severn Bridge and the (cable-stayed) Second Severn Crossing which span the estuary between South Gloucestershire and Monmouthshire. The client, Severn River Crossing PLC, needed to be able to create a hierarchical access control system in which a user’s rights to enter specific areas of the two bridges could be based on seniority, job profile, date and even time of day. There is a total of four maintenance buildings at the two bridges (which are 15 miles apart) and a toll plaza at each. Management make clear distinctions between staff employed on maintenance and those on the toll plazas with the different job profiles being reflected in the access rights encoded into the ACT cards. Emergency managers have 24-hour access to all buildings. Severn River Crossing opted for versatile smart-card technology by using ACTpro DESFire EV1 1040 proximity reader. This is a panel-mount unit which will read serial numbers from any MIFARE card and can produce ‘Clock & Data’ or ‘Weigand’ output. It can be used both indoors and outdoors. Between 200 and 300 users are currently registered on the Severn River Crossing system and the flexibility of the ACTWinPro control software is allowing managers to set up short-term access rights for contractors and segregate access privileges according to role. Staffs are also able to use the software to perform a time & attendance function. A lost card is easily removed from the database and a replacement issued promptly. In crucial areas of the two sites, staff may be required to identify themselves through a pin code as well as at the proximity reader or even be identified by two authorised people before access is given. ACT products are IP-addressable and the client has integrated the access control devices into its IP network which communicates across the two bridges. There is also integration with the bridge CCTV systems so that atypical behaviour (such as a user failing to identify themselves after three attempts) can activate CCTV recording. "The ACT system has reduced the number of conventional keys carried by staff and gives us prompt access to vital areas" The bridges are using various door controllers including the ACTpro 4000. This is a two-door controller that can extend to a total of 16 doors via ACTpro door stations. In turn up to 250 ACTpro 4000s may be networked via a PC interface to facilitate up to 4,000 doors. The ACTpro 4000 can support 60,000 users. It offers 256 time zones and Disability Discrimination Act-compliant timer facilities as well as times anti-passback and flash-upgradeable firmware. Alan Jones, Systems Engineer at Severn River Crossing PLC, said: “The ACT system has reduced the number of conventional keys carried by staff and gives us prompt access to vital areas. The control software has improved general auditing abilities, facilitated compliance with certain Payment Card Industry standards and is proving particularly valuable for fire mustering since musters are produced automatically to several printers across the sites.” The Severn Bridge was opened in 1966 to replace the ferry crossing from Aust near Bristol to Beachley and so provide a direct link for the M4 motorway into Wales. The bridge now carries approximately 600,000 vehicles per month in both directions and has Grade I listed status. The Second Severn Crossing (which carries the present-day M4) was constructed in the 1990s to improve traffic flows and reduce rush-hour and summer holiday congestion. It carries approximately 1.8m vehicles per month, has three lanes and a hard shoulder in each direction. The bridge portals are close to Sudbrook on the Welsh side and Severn Beach in South Gloucestershire.

An integrated access control system provides sophisticated services at the ETO Park sports complex, an entertainment and shopping centre in Györ, Hungary.Györ is a city with 125,000 residents in northwest Hungary, around halfway between Vienna, the capital of Austria, and Budapest, the Hungarian capital. The city's former ETO FC football stadium was redeveloped into a full-blown sports and leisure complex a while ago. ETO Park, as the ultramodern site is now known, houses a shopping mall and entertainment centre, a hotel and a residential soccer training academy as well as the local football club's rebuilt stadium. It can currently accommodate 16,000 spectators to UEFA standards, or nearly double that number if further developed.It has heated turf and a water management system to provide the best possible playing conditions come rain or shine. In addition to hosting football matches in the warmer season, the stadium is also a venue for concerts, shows and cultural events the year round. Access control and e-ticketing at the ETO Park complex were once barcode-based. Much of that has now been replaced with a G4S WinAccess access control system that integrates multifunctional LEGIC technology.It was a complex project that covered vehicle access, public access to event spaces, e-ticketing as well as a customer loyalty scheme for restaurants, a beauty salon and a children's play centre operating inside ETO Park. All were tied into a LEGIC based system - and this during the height of the football season. It meant integrating the previously installed and operating Kaba full-height turnstiles, long-range G4S LEGIC readers linked to vehicle barriers and an external e-ticketing system. The programmable system components used in the project (access controllers, LEGIC readers, etc.) were developed by G4S Security Systems Ltd for multifunctional integration tasks like this one.   Access control and e-ticketing at the ETO Park complex were once barcode-based The tried-and-tested Interticket e-ticketing system continues to be used for issuing regular barcode tickets to football matches, while season tickets have been converted into LEGIC cards - resulting in a parallel application of barcode and LEGIC contactless credentials for event access. LEGIC cards can be used in the soccer club's catering facilities, where G4S LEGIC desktop readers link the stadium's restaurants with the access control system. In the complex's mall section, specially designed SAG LEGIC soft wristbands with Velcro have been introduced to the children's play area and the beauty salon.The system integration has been a success, and the recently implemented LEGIC based loyalty functions are operating smoothly in the stadium's restaurants and shops. The story is set to continue, with specifications and plans now in development for electronic wallet functions to be used with a connected restaurant management system and for multifunctional access to the stadium hotel.