Page 46 - Security Today, June 2017

The Right Combination North Central Washington airport seeks performance in security upgrade
BJy Mike Hardy
ointly owned and operated by the ports of Chelan and Douglas Counties, Pangborn Memorial Airport plays a vital role in connecting the North Central Washing- ton region to the national and international air trans- port systems. The airport’s daily scheduled service to
Seattle-Tacoma International Airport provides the region with one- stop connecting service to 20 major international and 75 domestic destinations. A 2001 study commissioned by the Washington Depart- ment of Transportation found that Pangborn Memorial Airport di- rectly and indirectly supports 632 jobs and contributes more than $47 million annually to the local economy.
Accommodating Growth
For Pangborn Memorial Airport, the reasons for a network refresh were many. Airport growth was prompting the addition of new tech- nologies—such as VoIP phones, an IP-based TV system, a new secu- rity access control system, a parking payment kiosk and an IP sur- veillance system—all of which required a stronger and more robust network to handle the increased traffic.
The airport’s previous network gear was severely limited by 100 MBps switching. In order to carry the airport’s new IP surveillance data, VoIP and IP-based TV traffic, its network needed a Gigabit backbone, PoE functionality and the ability to prioritize data traffic across VLANs.
While these changes were planned to take place gradually over the course of two budget cycles, other factors prompted the need for a quicker timetable.
On April 30, 2015, a community partnership between the Douglas County Sheriff ’s Office, Douglas County Fire District, Pangborn Me- morial Airport, RiverCom Dispatch and Ballard/Lifeline Ambulance had planned to conduct a full-scale mock “Active Shooter” training and functional emergency exercise at the Pangborn Memorial Air- port. To capture the important footage from this exercise, Pangborn Memorial Airport moved the installation of IP surveillance cameras to the top of the priority list.
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Network cameras for IP surveillance, plus managed Layer 2 switches that provide secure connections, faster speed, enhanced per- formance and improved manageability.
With a pending network overhaul and the fast-approaching emer- gency exercise, Pangborn Memorial Airport was driven to action. It needed full network performance and comprehensive IP surveillance coverage quickly, all within a very tight budget. Since the current sys- tem upgrade was too expensive, the airport began to explore a more affordable solution.
For assistance, Pangborn turned to its technology reseller, Firefly Technology, which also serves as the outsourced IT department for the airport, as well as the Ports of Chelan and Douglas Counties. Because Firefly was already familiar with D-Link’s business-class switching and networking gear, recommending D-Link was an easy choice.
“Although the gear previously installed had all the capabilities Pangborn needed, the cost was significantly higher, especially when you consider all the ongoing SMARTnet contracts to keep the firm- ware warranties and support active,” said Denton Meier, CEO and chairman of Firefly. “With D-Link, all of the support and warranties are included for life. It just came down to price-per-performance. In addition, the Port of Chelan County had already been using D-Link networking equipment for a number of years and was more than sat- isfied with its performance.”
With that decision made, Pangborn Memorial Airport began pur- chasing and installing networking equipment in stages as budget dol- lars became available. During this time, Firefly was able to upgrade various parts of the airport’s network infrastructure, linking the main terminal to the maintenance facility, the fire station and the general aviation terminal (located about a half-mile away).
“The airport purchased half of the gear last year and the other half this year,” Meier said. “We were all set to deploy the final por- tions of the solution this year, but the installation got ramped up to a very quick deployment due to the live shooter exercise.”
To get the job done, Firefly installed D-Link managed switches at the network core and light-managed (Smart) switches on the periphery.
AIRPORT SECURITY
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