Brigham Young University (BYU) in Utah, U.S. has deployed Flir Systems thermal security cameras to look after its newly renovated football field. After determining a mix of thermal security cameras would provide 24/7 quality video and range performance, Sgt. Wayne Beck, Security Systems Coordinator of Campus Police, and the university administration team integrated the cameras' video outputs onto the existing security network, and tied everything together with video analytics.
Brigham Young University (BYU) in Utah, U.S. has deployed Flir Systems thermal security cameras to look after its newly renovated football field. After determining a mix of thermal security cameras would provide 24/7 quality video and range performance, Sgt. Wayne Beck, Security Systems Coordinator of Campus Police, and the university administration team integrated the cameras' video outputs onto the existing security network, and tied everything together with video analytics.
The field of BYU's LaVell Edwards Stadium 28 year-old sod was removed, a new drainage system installed, and new grass laid down in early 2009. The renovation took about five months to complete and cost more than US$1 million. The university needed to safeguard this significant investment and had been looking for a viable detection method for several years. The threats at the university football field range from thrill-seeking trespassers jumping the fence to get on the field after hours, to low frequency, high-impact vandalism perpetrated by rival fans or other ill-intended trespassers.
The job of keeping trespassers off the field was complicated by the stadium open policy to the public during daylight hours, and the need to secure the facility's perimeter, but keeping it accessible to maintenance crews and grounds keepers. Visible light cameras were quickly ruled out due to their limited nighttime performance. These cameras cannot generate images of intruders beyond the range of their illumination source, limiting their effectiveness to a few hundred feet, unsuitable in an environment thatcovered several miles.
The task of securing the field fell to the university's campus police. They temporarily installed a Flir thermal security camera on a tripod in the stadium press box. “We resolved three trespasses in the first week,” said Beck. “It's a sure-fi re way of catching people.”
Camera analytics allows operators to set up pre-determined alarm areas that are active at different times of day. For instance, during daylight hours, the perimeter and stands are open, and maintenance crews can access the field. Later in the afternoon, the stands are open but access to the field is closed and the field itself is alarmed. When school officials close the stadium for the day, they activate the automated surveillance and alarm system, which encompasses the entire facility.
If human activity is detected in a denied zone during any of these periods, alarms are triggered that alert campus police to respond accordingly. Once command center personnel receive an alarm, police dispatchers send officers to the scene. While these officers are en route, dispatchers can bring up and direct optical PTZ cameras to the violated area in order to gather more information the responding officers will need once they arrive on-scene.