No Security threats at CARIFTA
By Ryan Haas
Reporter-SKNVibes.com
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Superintendent Ian Queeley, CARIFTA Director of Security and Safety
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BASSETERRE St. Kitts-DESPITE record attendance levels at the 37th annual CARIFTA Games held in St. Kitts this past weekend, Superintendant Ian Queeley, Director of Security and Safety said that the four day event was completed with no notable security issues arising, barring some traffic congestion.
An estimated 7000 persons gathered at the Silver Jubilee Stadium for the track & field event, creating a traffic nightmare on some days with motorists trying to get to and from the venue.
Queeley told SKNVibes.com that the road along the west side of the Stadium proved to be the most problematic, as some patrons ignored “no parking” signs that were posted in the area.
“Vehicles were being parked in residential lots and then those persons were attempting to exit the same way they entered. This was a problem because our traffic plan was designed to only have vehicles flowing in one direction around the stadium. For future events I think we could begin educating the public sooner about the traffic plan. There should have been more signage in certain areas as well.”
He said that the occurrence of more serious incidents were a non-issue due the 70 person mix of Police and security forces.
“The security check points we set up prevented anyone from bringing offensive weapons onto the grounds….I spoke to several representatives from other countries and they were impressed with the effectiveness of our security forces. At some of the past CARIFTA games, fights tended to break out, but we had no such confrontations,” said Queeley. ~~Adz:Right~~
Contracts and sponsorships of the CARIFTA games also had to be enforced, such as Island Purified being the only brand of water allowed in the stadium or ZIZ being the only entity with rights to video tape, but the Superintendent said that offenders of these rules were fully compliant when approached.
“Overall, security at the games was very successful,” said Queeley, extending his thanks to the public for their compliance and for helping to show St. Kitts & Nevis as being capable of hosting such a large scale event.
