Pattaya police again are complaining that the city’s multimillion-baht CCTV system is in such bad shape, they can’t use it to catch criminals along Beach Road.
Police claimed Aug. 16 that beachfront cameras don’t work, leaving them without an important crime-solving tool.
For example, on July 28, a tourist had his valuables snatched and when police asked to see the camera footage, it appeared that none of the cameras from Central Pattaya to Walking Street were working.
Complaints about faulty and poorly maintained cameras aren’t new. Almost exactly a year ago to the day, Banglamung District’s chief ordered 1,600 cameras be checked to ensure they worked following last August’s Bangkok shrine bombing.
Pattaya City Council members previously had indicated that as many as 90 percent of the devices were broken.
New Pattaya administrators appointed by the military junta said last week that, in fact, the cameras themselves work, but frequently suffered network-connection failures.
Surasak Chantasomboon, director of the Technological and Communications Department, apologized and said cameras cannot record any footage if there is a network failure. He added that the network was down at the time of the July 28 crime cited by police.
He said the computer system suffered a virus attack, but has since been fixed.
Surasak cited other factors that also have interrupted the network, such as power failures, flooding and transformer explosions.
He said city hall has jumped on the issue, however, and promised that things will be working better soon.
Currently there are 2,077 cameras in five areas, including 401 CCTV cameras along Kratinglai, Pattaya Beach and Jomtien Beach, 404 at intersections and busy roads, 513 around buildings such as shopping malls and supercenters, 511 in public parks and spaces, 48 on Koh Larn and 200 more that are watching marine transport.
Pattaya had hired a company with a budget of 8 million baht to maintain 1,500 cameras. If there are any problems, they are guaranteed to be fixed within five working days.
He said Pattaya so far had paid out about 100,000 baht in repairs and confirmed that 95 percent of the cameras are functioning properly.
