More football clubs are reported taking the incident and task management software, Halo (v5). Chelsea FC will use Halo (v5) for the 24/7 security contract at their west London ground Stamford Bridge as well as the Premier League club’s Cobham training ground in Surrey. The operations software is also being taken by Nottingham Forest and Birmingham City, being already used by Watford FC, West Bromwich Albion in the second tier and Mansfield Town FC in the fourth, as well as clubs in the MLS (Major League Soccer, USA) and in security operations at UK stadia and venues.
Halo’s developers report that the incident and task management system handled over 2,500 events, 88,000 incidents and 550,000 tasks for some of the world’s biggest venue and event operations last year.
OCS Group Senior Security Manager (working for Chelsea Football Club), Bakary Bah, said: “We’ve seen fantastic results implementing the Halo System into match-day and everyday security operations across Stamford Bridge and Cobham Training Ground. Halo’s user-friendly appearance and flexible ability to ensure all our safety & security management is streamlined into one place was a huge reason for us choosing Halo over other platforms. We run our site security program to the highest possible standard, and the reporting capabilities of Halo help us to manage and audit all incidents, tasks, patrols and activities continuously all within one, easy-to-use platform.”
Halo was founded by Lloyd Major, a former counterterrorism police officer, crowd safety and event security adviser with 20 years of policing experience, including police training and public order command at sporting events. While an operational police planner in the UK he gained a Master’s degree in Emergency Planning and Management and developed a new process for threat assessment at public events, which became national policing policy.
Lloyd also worked around England in Operational Planning Units, including sitting on Safety Advisory Groups (SAGs) for specialist planning advice for sporting and entertainment events, major tournaments, protests and operations. This was then channelled into creating Halo.
Halo CEO and Founder Lloyd Major said: “Clubs are expected to provide the very best crowd safety and security initiatives within their operations for fan safety. We are proud to support even more clubs on that mission, bringing digital simplicity to both matchday and everyday use with our platform. It is reassuring to see such a proactive and robust approach to safety and security from these clubs in the running of their stadia, the safety of their visitors and event experiences.”
The Halo (v5) software can integrate all streams of information and intelligence, to act as a command-and-control function that operates from a standard laptop, tablet or smart phone, and brings together more than ten systems into one, with over 75 client-led features. Halo integrates monitoring and recording of multiple feeds of information across a venue, whether security, CCTV and live drone feeds or health and safety, cleaning, medical, public reports, ticket scanning and staff accreditation – and next year will include crowd management, crowd density, flow, sentiment, mood and capacity.
It means that when an incident occurs, all the actions, updates and decisions taken by staff are recorded in one location for decision-making, transparency and debriefing with an audit trail. It also provides a reporting mechanism on crowd safety, health and safety and general incident logging across all custom types faced by a venue.
Among events the software was deployed at are the 2023 Eurovision song contest, 2022 FIFA World Cup fan zones in Qatar, the Miami F1 Grand Prix, Silverstone’s British Grand Prix and Moto GP. Further UK uses include at Notting Hill Carnival, the Glastonbury festival, the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, the funeral of HM Queen Elizabeth II and coronation of HM King Charles III.
The crowd and event safety platform has also been deployed at the NEC in Birmingham, ExCeL London, Motorpoint Arena Nottingham and ACC Liverpool, pictured.
