It goes without saying that petrol stations are high-risk environments. When individuals act recklessly, like in this incident, the threat to the safety of the public is clear – not to mention criminal damage that could happen to the petrol forecourt too.
In providing remote CCTV monitoring for petrol stations across the UK, Farsight operators understand that they have to be always vigilant for potential threats. That means they need to recognise when a situation could escalate into a dangerous scenario, before it has chance to reach that point.
The incident
On Monday 2 November 2015 at approximately 7.30pm operators monitoring an unmanned petrol station in Doncaster received an alarm for authorisation of a petrol pump. On viewing the live CCTV cameras on site, the operators noticed a well-intentioned mother teaching her son how to use a petrol pump and fill a car.
However, it is against the law for a person under the age of 16 to operate a petrol pump, due to the risks involved. The Farsight operator suspected that the boy was under the age of 16, so issued an audio warning to the petrol forecourt and disabled the pumps remotely from the Farsight Observatory.
The operator then contacted the on-call store manager for the forecourt, letting them know of the incident and the action taken.
The result
As with all of our sites, we establish a set response agreement, which outlines how Farsight operators should respond in certain scenarios. For unmanned forecourts these agreements rigorously outline how operators should respond depending on the level of risk. For example, if a naked flame is identified on site then all petrol pumps can be disabled and the emergency services called. In this instance, however, the situation was not as severe – hence why the emergency services were not called but instead an agreed member of staff was informed.
It’s through understanding the unique risks that each site faces that we’re able to provide the very best security measures for our clients, whilst also helping to ensure public safety.
You can find out more about the petrol station security services we provide or learn more about remote CCTV monitoring.
