Airport Surveillance Q&A

How should a new multilayered approach to airport security be implemented when taking into consideration the entire airport complex?

Every airport complex is different, and each has unique physical layouts and surrounding terrain. Land, water, hills, trees, buildings and roads all impact the way in which their perimeters are protected. Runway layouts, staging areas and terminal buildings also differ in design and layout, all of which affect sensor sight lines.

In addition to these widely varying physical layouts, airports must consider the need for adequate warning and response times for an unwanted intrusion. It is not sufficient to simply know a breach of the perimeter has occurred; airport security personnel must be able to assess the threat, track movement before and after intrusion, and react quickly to deter the threat.

A multilayered approach to airport surveillance should include a combination of sensors such as CCTV cameras, thermal imagers, and radars. These sensors can be networked through a common command and control software backbone, providing situational awareness and video analytics to improve efficiency. A standard scenario might include medium to long-range radars that provide a command view of the airport facility. These must be augmented with short-range radars to eliminate blind spots, all of which need to be interoperable. And selected cameras with slew-to cue functionality. To further explain, the radar can detect an intruder, track movement and provide geo positioning, while the cameras provide visual identification and information of the impending threat to assist in measuring the response.

This multilayered approach is not new. ICx has supplied hundreds of ground-based radars of varying range capability to the US Air Force for air base flight line and perimeter security. Commercial airport authorities are also adopting our multi-layered approach. Houston Hobby and Bush airports have recently installed integrated ICx radar and thermal imaging systems to secure their perimeters and staging areas.

What do you mean by integrated wide area surveillance solutions? What are the benefits of this as opposed to traditional forms of security?

Perimeter security is all about deterrence, detection, assessment and action. Traditional methods focus on fence systems and fence alarms. The flaw in these systems is three fold: first and foremost, when a fence alarm sounds the security breach is either in progress or has already occurred; second, current technology is prone to false alarms; and third, these systems provide no tracking, assessment or situational awareness capabilities. Security officers need more information in order to react appropriately. They need to know what type of threat they are dealing with, where it is coming from, and where it is headed. While fences remain an important physical deterrence, they do not provide a complete solution.

Wide area surveillance provides 360 degree situational awareness at an airport. The concepts and technologies inherent in this solution have evolved from military force protection and air base protection, as well as the solutions ICx has provided at high value critical assets such as nuclear plants and ports.

Our radars track all movements in a 360 degree field of regard and can provide an alert to activity well before a fence breach. Our radars have sufficient angular resolution to direct thermal imagers and spotlights to the specific threat and provide instant assessment and identification capabilities.

In contrast, a camera-only solution requires security operators to simultaneously monitor a large quantity video. A fence-only solution does not provide any response time to intercept the intruders.

How cost effective a solution is this?

The deployment of a multi-layered, wide area surveillance solution enables comprehensive perimeter coverage. Wide area radars combined with slew-to-cue cameras and thermal imagers provide an important cost advantage in total system cost and responsiveness. The use of radar in the perimeter solution reduces the camera requirement. The longer response time can enable better deployment of resources. Both which reduce total system cost. Thus, an integrated radar/camera solution provides advantages in both up front acquisition and life cycle costs.

The most cost effective solution uses a family of radars of various range capability integrated to a family of cameras with various range performance, all fully interoperable. This is because the physical layout, terrain and infrastructure are all different. Rarely will one sensor suffice. By comparison, a camera-only solution requires many more cameras, in turn driving more infrastructure and more complex command and control than a multilayered approach. Solutions integrated by the sensor manufacturer will realize a cost advantage over custom integration as well.

Interestingly, ICx ground-based radars are in the same price range as thermal imaging cameras with similar range capability, but provide a 360 degree surveillance capability. This is an important advantage for airport security managers and operators to understand. We are committed to providing effective perimeter security solutions to the airport authorities and continue to demonstrate that an integrated radar/camera solution with slew-to-cue capability is a powerful, affordable solution.

What innovative methods of surveillance have been recently developed to meet airport facilities and perimeter security requirements?

ICx takes a systematic approach to airport perimeter surveillance and security. Led by our security and transportation system design and engineering organization, we perform a top down threat based site assessment. In parallel we have developed sophisticated design and simulation software tools for simulating the performance and placement of a combination of surveillance radars and cameras. The output of these site assessment and simulations gives the integrator, and ultimately the airport operator, a clear understanding of the optimized perimeter solution. This information can then be used to develop system and subsystem specifications.

On the hardware side we are rolling out a full complement of new products this year, including new intermediate range radars which are ideal for airport applications. We are also announcing new high performance thermal imagers with built-in zoom, new capabilities in our command and control software, new surveillance tower configurations, as well as new CBRNE detection instruments.

Most importantly, we have a total organizational focus on bringing our sensors and software together to create integrated subsystems products. These subsystems represent highly capable surveillance building blocks for the designer and integrator to deploy. For example, our radar/camera subsystems are managed by Resolution, which is our scalable command and control platform that includes video management, storage and analytics software solutions. Resolution also enables interoperability between our subsystems and larger legacy command and control architectures to help form the backbone of a total wide area airport security solution.

How does ICx Technologies solutions differ to those currently on the market?

Our surveillance products are developed exclusively for wide area perimeter security, while other products are not adapted and were originally designed for other applications. For instance, our ground radars were specifically designed to provide air base security and are directly applicable to airport applications. We have a complete family of radars optimized for different range requirements. All have extremely low false alarm rates, a vitally important requirement for an airport, where the cost and impact of inadvertent security alerts and actions are unacceptable. Our radars can detect tangential motion as well as motion towards the radar.

Our command and control software, Resolution, is widely deployed in the security and intelligent transportation markets. It is extensively employed in transportation centers to monitor and control hundreds of cameras, radars, sensors, signs, and other devices. Resolution enables a convergence of security and transportation management, creating a common command interface. By integrating our radar control, we have brought the power of Resolution to all our surveillance products, providing our customers with the option for a comprehensive and easily scalable command and control function.

Our digital imaging products provide multi-sensor solutions, with highly integrated thermal imaging and CCD solutions. Our cameras include VisionSense technology for blending the thermal and CCD video images, and have been designed from the ground up for ease of integration. Our newest Orion product has an industry leading zoom capability for flexible operation over medium to long ranges.

At a higher level, in addition to the industry’s strongest building blocks, another differentiator for ICx is the substantial degree of integration that we obtain with our various products. Radars, cameras and software have been combined to form powerful surveillance subsystems. This creates a big advantage in cost by eliminating the need for complex and site unique integration. Accordingly, schedule, reliability and maintainability advantages exist. ICx has invested in this integration in order to allow a practically “drop in” solution for comprehensive security systems. Thus our integrator, prime or end use customers have many of the inherent integration risks removed. They may focus their efforts on the total solution rather than sensor level integration.

Our manned and unmanned tower solutions further support our integration strategies by providing mobile sensor and communications platforms for perimeter, terminal and parking security.

ICx is not only a developer of advanced security products, but we also perform site assessment and system design and management Our experience in transportation is extensive, and we routinely provide studies, site designs, specifications and project management of security and transportation systems. This experience uniquely gives ICx product developers an end user perspective.

We employ more than 200 engineers and advanced scientists working on research and development projects with key federal agencies, national laboratories and universities. ICx has invested more than $100 million to develop leading-edge surveillance and detection technologies that are exceptionally sensitive, accurate, compact and affordable.