A record order, for a total of 611 uninterruptible power supply units, is currently being supplied by Meissner Uninterruptible Power to back up new access and closed circuit TV security measures for the 66 high-security prisons located within the borders of South Africa.
Sondolo IT, a subsidiary of the nationwide security agency, Bosasa Security, was awarded the tender for the new prisons security contract by the Department of Correctional Services (DCS), against strong competition from both local and international companies.
The architecture of the new system is a national control hub, based in a high security centre in Pretoria, and six regional control centres interlinked to access control and CCTV in the 66 prisons. All are provided with Meissner UPSs.
"The main mindset was to build redundancy into the whole system," says Sondola IT's Trevor Mathenjwa, who heads up the project. "Instead of having a large UPS at each correctional facility, we decided that the best option was to have clusters of equipment, each with its own UPS and power storage unit to power the low voltage equipment in that cluster.
"The central control room is able to monitor and control all the equipment, including the UPSs, which are supplied with their own software and are housed in individual, custom made enclosures. If there is a problem with the power supply in one area, it can be addressed and the rest of the facility is still running."
The gates to each facility - the main entrance, visitors' entrance, and entrance for enrolment of prisoners - are all separately controlled and should there, for example, be a problem with controlling access to one of them, access control can immediately be diverted to another gate.
The regional control centres are able to monitor and control the security equipment and UPSs in all the correctional facilities in their areas. Should a problem develop in any regional control centre, control can be switched to another centre.
And even if there is a problem at the national control hub, control can be switched to Bosasa's own control centre in Mogale City, which is fully equipped with the necessary monitoring and control equipment.
The DCS has some 33 000 employees, about 80& of whom will have to be trained in the operation of the system, which will employ a biometric finger-printing system combined with a proximity card. All inmates and visitors will be enrolled in the system, which will also enable personnel, whenever a visitor arrives at the facility, to establish the availability of the prisoner at the time.
"The Department's personnel who will be responsible for training employees, will be trained by Bosasa Security and issued with certificates of competency," Mathenjwa says "In addition to supplying the 528 1 kVA and 83 3 kVA UPSs, Meissner will be responsible for training DCS personnel in the maintenance of the UPSs. Each piece of equipment in a UPS installation will be bar-coded, which they will have to scan to record that all the necessary maintenance has been carried out. Meissner will also certify all installers and technicians."
The deadline for having all equipment installed and all technicians trained is March 2006. "Our target is to have the entire system up and running by mid-December this year, to allow the months of January and February for training DCS personnel," he added.
For more information contact Graham Beyleveld, Meissner Uninterruptible Power Supplies, 011 824 0202, grahamb@meissner.co.za
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