Panama City Airport Teams With Navy, TSA On New Security System

Fri, 30 Nov '07
"Backbone" May Be Moved To New Airport In 2010

A Florida airport will be the testbed for a new perimeter security system, developed in partnership with the Transportation Security Administration and the Naval Surface Warfare Center-Panama City.

On Tuesday, the Panama City-Bay County International Airport Authority unanimously approved the plan to installed the experimental Critical Area Protection System -- dubbed "Backbone") at PFN.

"You will have a very robust core system that your folks will be using at no cost to the airport," David Vernon, TSA deputy federal security director for the airport, told the Panama City News-Herald.

The system will utilize wireless cameras, motion detectors and other sensors along the airport's perimeter fence. All information gathered with feed into a central operation center.

All parties involved will keep a sharp eye on how the new security monitoring system performs... to determine whether the equipment should be transferred to a new, 4,000-acre airport now under construction in West Bay. As ANN reported, the new facility -- the first all-new airport to be constructed since 9/11/2001 -- is scheduled to open by early 2010.

There's no explicit guarantee the system will be installed at the new PFN... but that's a likely scenario, according to project manager Michael Adams.

"The equipment we have here will transition to the new airport," Adams said.