Royal Ascot at York

Even the most carefully planned events evolve from moment to moment, making flexibility and teamwork two of our most valuable assets. Royal Ascot at York was no exception.

With a camera on royal duties, we installed CCTV to monitor the Queen as she entered the racecourse and to follow the coach procession to the Grandstand. But during day one, the Royal Protection Officers identified that the turn onto the racecourse was a critical and busy point for the procession, with many members of the public gathering here to watch it at close proximity.

This area was not covered by CCTV due to its awkward positioning around a corner. This meant that monitoring this area was handled by a lone Police Officer relaying by radio his perception of the current crowd situation at that point. The Protection Officers asked if we could move our cameras 500m to cover this view so we could monitor it in the Control Room– which we did immediately, leaving it in position for the remainder of the week to monitor people walking to and from the racecourse when it wasn't on Royal Duties!