Glastonbury Festival-goers protected by Bosch

19 Nov 09

More than 170,000 festival-goers at this year’s Glastonbury Festival were protected from the threat of crime thanks to a CCTV system reliant on Bosch Security Systems’ DiBos DVRs.

By Brian Sims

The Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts – to give this renowned event its full name – is the largest greenfield music and performing arts festival in the world.

Best known for its contemporary music, of course, the event also features dance, comedy, theatre, circus, cabaret and many other arts.

At each of the last three festivals, over 700 acts played on more than 80 stages to a capacity of 177,500.

Crime figures released by Avon and Somerset Police showed that arrest figures for the 2008 festival stood at 134 (down on 2007), and that 99.7% of revellers didn’t experience any crime.

Installation for the 2009 event

West Haddon-based Crimesecure Surveillance Services has worked very closely with several police forces for many years. These partnerships involve providing advice and support for local crime reduction initiatives, as well as mobile CCTV coverage for crime operations and major events.

Helen Healey, the company’s installations manager, explained: “We have been working with the organisers at Glastonbury for a few years now, and it was clear from the start what was required in terms of security provision.”

Having been made aware of the benefits to be derived from Bosch Security Systems’ DiBos DVRS¬ – including the ease of accessing images, the quality of those images and the speed of set-up – Healey and her team decided to trial the solution ‘in the field’. Now, by her own admission, Healey “would not specify anything else”.

DiBos is a powerful, network-oriented digital video surveillance and recording system featuring advanced MPEG-4 digital encoding technology for the highest levels of image quality, information content and data storage efficiency.

Multi-image or full-screen displays

DiBos gives authorised users fast, convenient access to view live or recorded images. It allows up to 30 local cameras and 32 IP-networked cameras to be selected instantly, with either multi-image or full-screen display. Date/time, location, zone and selected camera information are also displayed.

A powerful search function enables recorded images to be found easily, while playback speed can be specifically controlled to pinpoint exact events. Searches may be made either locally or remotely, over a company network or via the Internet.

The technology allows viewing of both live and recorded images and has extensive communication, networking and systems interfacing features. It’s designed for a range of end user installations including banks, retail chains, railway stations and airports, public and corporate offices, city centres and industrial facilities.