Janet Gogerty's Blog: Sandscript - Posts Tagged "closed-circuit-television"
Sandscript in Secret
We were on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall; a dog walker, a few sheep, a man tending a crackling bonfire in the garden of the solitary house. A strange noise made us look up into the evening sky. We zoomed in with our cameras, not a UFO, but the first drone we had ever seen. Not the sort that drops bombs luckily, but what was it doing? Watching us? Is there anywhere you can go without being seen?
The next day we returned and drove up a road to investigate the tall mast on Caradon Hill we had seen from afar. Warning signs said ‘Private road, access only.’ We walked the rest of the way up the grassy hill, veering away from the unmade road, past the gigantic ‘guy ropes’, steel cables holding up the metal tower. There was a fenced complex of buildings, entry by security pass only, CCTV in operation. Obviously a secret facility; we were being filmed and I expected armed troops to emerge at any moment to take us in for interrogation. The signs were headed by the word Arqiva – a sinister secret organisation for sure.
The truth was more prosaic when I looked the place up on Wickepedia.
‘The Caradon Hill transmitting station is a broadcasting and telecommunications facility. Built in 1961, the station includes a 237.7 metres (780 ft) guyed steel lattice mast. The mean height for the television antennas is 603 metres (1,978 ft) above sea level. It is owned and operated by Arqiva, a British telecommunications company which provides infrastructure and broadcast transmission facilities in the United Kingdom and Ireland.’
But perhaps that information was a cover up; had we only escaped arrest because they had identified us as civilian ramblers?
We are all being watched, all the time. CCTV cameras we know about, on buses, station platforms, in shops. We don’t know if we are being filmed or watched live. Above us are police, military and coastguard helicopters.
It is not only people who are being watched, so is your vehicle. Drive down many main roads and your journey has been recorded by ANPR – Automatic Number Plate Recognition. If the car is stolen or of interest for any reason it will be spotted. Police cars can now carry similar equipment.
Writers of thrillers or crime novels have a harder time than ever helping their characters hide or escape, though in fiction and real life criminals are often one step ahead of new technology.
In ‘Brief Encounters of The Third Kind’
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-Encount...
the main characters know they are not only being observed, but controlled. There is no rational explanation for the inexplicable events and when they finally reach a glimpse of the truth it is not what they expected.
The next day we returned and drove up a road to investigate the tall mast on Caradon Hill we had seen from afar. Warning signs said ‘Private road, access only.’ We walked the rest of the way up the grassy hill, veering away from the unmade road, past the gigantic ‘guy ropes’, steel cables holding up the metal tower. There was a fenced complex of buildings, entry by security pass only, CCTV in operation. Obviously a secret facility; we were being filmed and I expected armed troops to emerge at any moment to take us in for interrogation. The signs were headed by the word Arqiva – a sinister secret organisation for sure.
The truth was more prosaic when I looked the place up on Wickepedia.
‘The Caradon Hill transmitting station is a broadcasting and telecommunications facility. Built in 1961, the station includes a 237.7 metres (780 ft) guyed steel lattice mast. The mean height for the television antennas is 603 metres (1,978 ft) above sea level. It is owned and operated by Arqiva, a British telecommunications company which provides infrastructure and broadcast transmission facilities in the United Kingdom and Ireland.’
But perhaps that information was a cover up; had we only escaped arrest because they had identified us as civilian ramblers?
We are all being watched, all the time. CCTV cameras we know about, on buses, station platforms, in shops. We don’t know if we are being filmed or watched live. Above us are police, military and coastguard helicopters.
It is not only people who are being watched, so is your vehicle. Drive down many main roads and your journey has been recorded by ANPR – Automatic Number Plate Recognition. If the car is stolen or of interest for any reason it will be spotted. Police cars can now carry similar equipment.
Writers of thrillers or crime novels have a harder time than ever helping their characters hide or escape, though in fiction and real life criminals are often one step ahead of new technology.
In ‘Brief Encounters of The Third Kind’
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-Encount...
the main characters know they are not only being observed, but controlled. There is no rational explanation for the inexplicable events and when they finally reach a glimpse of the truth it is not what they expected.
Sandscript
I like to write first drafts with pen and paper; at home, in busy cafes, in the garden, at our beach hut... even sitting in a sea front car park waiting for the rain to stop I get my note book out. We
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