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Panic buttons for neighbourhood watch

PIMA’s panic button solution has been chosen by the municipality of Chimalhuacán in Mexico as part of its neighbourhood watch programme. The project was integrated by HX Sistemas, a local system integration company.

The city of Chimalhuacán is one of the most populated in the State of Mexico and has the highest crime rate in the country. The neighbourhood committee requested assistance from the local government in providing a neighbourhood alarm solution that would help prevent crime and vandalism as well as ensure help in case of an emergency. The municipal authorities concerned by the safety of the neighbours provided the appropriate solution with PIMA.

The solution consists of wireless long-range panic buttons given to the residents of the neighbourhood, which report to assigned alarm panels distributed around the city, installed in houses or commercial buildings.

In case of any illicit or emergency event, by triggering a wireless panic button, the neighbours create a massive audio-visual notification, activating a siren and a strobe light on their assigned FORCE alarm panel and a specific report is sent.

The FORCE panel reports the event via RF (radio frequency) to a central monitoring station on the municipal police’s central command centre. The report includes information on which panel was activated and which user pressed the panic button. In addition, each FORCE alarm panel corresponds to a WhatsApp group including all the panic button users of this panel, and the command centre.

Upon receiving an event at the command centre, officers communicate with the user who pressed the button, or anyone else from that alarm’s group database, to understand the nature of the alarm and to take whatever action is necessary according to the nature of the emergency reported.

This safety solution has already proved effective: a dangerous group of assailants was arrested due to the combined efforts of the local community, police forces, HX Sistemas, and PIMA products. To demonstrate the success of the project, the community has experienced an overall decrease in the crime rate of between 12 and 15 percent since the PIMA equipment was installed.

The solution provided by PIMA

• FORCE alarm system mounted on a board.

• Each FORCE panel supports up to 64 wireless panic buttons with extended range of more than 500 m.

• Access to virtual panic buttons on the PIMAlink app.

• Communication to the central command centre via network backed up by long-range radio.

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