Port Of Houston Upgrades Security With Orsus Technology

  • Jul 18, 2008
Orsus has been awarded a contract for its Situator product suite with the Port of Houston Authority (PHA). The project will integrate hundreds of cameras and access points, plus other devices for the port authority's public terminals and enhance the PHA's capabilities with a more sophisticated and technologically advanced system.

The deployment of Situator is scheduled to begin in early August. Situator will be monitored 24 hours, seven days a week at the Port Coordination Center in Houston. A leader in its approach to security, the PHA is the first port authority to receive ISO 28000:2007 certification for its security management system.

Along with integrating hundreds of cameras and access points, Situator will bring together video management, video analytics, visitor management, police dispatch software and weather alert systems for the Port of Houston Authority. It will also enable the PHA to integrate with multiple internal and external communication systems, including Houston TranStar, a partnership of four government agencies to provide transportation management and emergency management services to the Greater Houston Region.

"Once we implement the Situator system, PHA will have enhanced capability for integrating our security technology," said Wade Battles, PHA Managing Director. "An added benefit of the new software is that it is more user-friendly."

Situator is a comprehensive Situation Management software platform that delivers clarity and control to enterprise control rooms-- enabling better coordination of the interaction between people, alerting sources and responses.

The Port of Houston is made up of the Port of Houston Authority and 150 private industrial companies located along the 25-mile stretch of the Houston Shipping Channel. In 2007, more than 225 million tons of cargo passed through the Port of Houston.

With Orsus' Situator, the Port of Houston Authority can integrate incident reporting, simulate security-related events for training purposes and integrate system analysis tools to provide a comprehensive security approach. It enables the port authority to also improve risk management, minimize vulnerability and comply with security regulations governing port facilities.

"The Port of Houston is home to the second largest petrochemical complex in the world and ranked first in the United States for foreign waterborne tonnage and second in total tonnage, which makes it a priority for the most advanced security solutions," said Gal Oron, president Americas at Orsus. "Orsus has field-proven integrations with other ports and is pleased to be the solution provider of choice to meet the needs of the Port of Houston Authority."

Situator reduces potentially costly human error, makes it easy to establish and maintain compliance with industry and government regulations and dramatically improves the speed and effectiveness of incident response and recovery while actually reducing operating costs.

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