High-Tech Security at Port of Long Beach
Mike McMullen, the security operations manager at the Port of Long Beach, talks to Activu about the new joint command and control center that was implemented New Port Residences in January 2009. Mr. McMullen was recruited to help define and develop the new center. The 28,000 square foot facility, which houses 10 million dollars worth of high-tech system equipment, is chartered with keeping the Port of Long Beach secure.
Could you begin by providing an overview about the Joint Command and Control Center at the Port of Long Beach?
The development of the new Joint Command and Control Center at the Port of Long Beach was a development project that spanned over five years. We officially broke ground in 2007 and the new building was turned over to us in Oct 2008. The security division moved in shortly after that in January 2009. So we haven’t been here quite a year yet. Our facility is a thirty million dollar structure full of high-tech security systems which keeps close watch on the Port. The building cost twenty million dollars and we’ve invested about ten million in the systems that reside inside the building, that doesn’t include all the sensors that are in and around the Port. The twenty-eight thousand square foot structure is three stories high with a heliport on top. All of our business operations reside on the third floor with multiple agencies residing in the building including the Coast Guard, Customs and Boarder Protection, Harbor Patrol, L.A. and Long Beach police departments and Marine Exchange. Our Harbor Department performs all of the camera maintenance in the field, when it’s required. We also have a very sophisticated commercial dive team with our own fifty foot boat and six full time divers on staff. These guys are diving in and around the Port every day. So from a day-to-day operational standpoint, it is a dynamic building with a lot of moving parts.
Can you easily integrate new software applications into the visualization solution?