Security Alarms’ Achilles Heel : When Phone Lines Go Out, Most Alert Systems Stop Operating Too : A CLOSER LOOK: Trends

When a fire disrupted telephone service in Orange County last month, a Security Pacific Bank branch in Santa Ana was forced to close for two days until technicians could repair the telephone wires leading to the vault’s alarm system.

The Santa Ana branch of Glendale Federal Savings & Loan, whose high-tech alarm system was disabled, stayed open for business, using armed guards for protection until telephone lines could be repaired and full use of the system restored.

Security alarm systems were cut off in 137 stores at MainPlace/Santa Ana mall, just blocks away from the site of the Feb. 22 fire, mall spokeswoman Judy Bijlani said. The mall has three major department stores and several jewelry stores. Santa Ana police added extra patrols to help monitor the mall, and many stores brought in their own guards, she said.

More than 90% of even the most sophisticated security systems in homes and businesses today depend on telephone lines to transmit information from sensors and detectors to an off-site computer center, called a central station.

Data from the alarm system is monitored 24 hours a day on computer video screens by employees at the central station. When a problem arises, the station notifies the police.

“When the telephone wires are down, the alarm systems are out,” Santa Ana Police Sgt. Collie Provence said. Bank employees could still sound an alarm and cameras could still record a robbery, but data could not be transmitted to the central station.

“Banks don’t like to discuss the problem,” said Charles G. Darsch, president of the Security Equipment Industry Assn. But the only alternative in such a situation, he said, “is to go back to the elementary way of doing things--bring in the armed guards.”

Jim Koelle, consultant and marketing director for a San Jose security systems firm, said backup systems are available but most people are unwilling to pay for them. “It’s a matter of priorities,” he said.

Many industry experts agree that long-range radio transmission is the only viable alternative to telephone lines. But the system is expensive, and telephone disruptions are not frequent enough to warrant the expense.

“As the level of protection rises, the cost rises exponentially,” Koelle said. In order to double the protection, a customer would have to pay four times as much, he said.

“It’s just not a cost-effective way to provide extra security, when telephone lines are reliable 99% of the time,” he said.

While defense contractors such as McDonnell Douglas Corp. use radio and microwave technology to back up their communication and alarm systems, Provence said, 99% of the business and residential alarms depend on telephone wires.

Average Cost Is $2,500

Richard A. Beunk, president of Western Burglar and Fire Alarm Assn., said a homeowner can buy an alarm system for as little as $200 but that the average system costs about $2,500.

“I tell people to figure it will cost $1 per square foot,” he said. Alarm systems for businesses may be more expensive, he said, depending on the level of protection that is desired.

Installation of a radio backup system could cost between $150,000 and $300,000, Beunk said. The per-minute charge for use of airwaves is much greater than for the use of a telephone line, he said. Alarm companies that supply radio back-up systems must lease time from companies that own the mountain-top antennas needed for long-range radio transmission, he added.

Microwave systems, which have a very short range, are rarely used except for priority security systems, such as those needed by defense contractors, he said.

Westec Security in Irvine, one of the largest residential security alarm companies in Southern California, has been preparing for emergencies similar to last month’s telephone outage.

“Radio signals are the wave of the future,” said Michael Kennedy, Westec’s executive vice president. The company is one of the few that has begun installing a radio signal backup to its telephone-line alarm system.

At the time of the telephone outage, however, the radio system was not operable in all areas of the county, Kennedy said. Westec, which primarily sells home security systems, sent armed patrols to the areas where its security systems failed, he said.

Although the industry is looking at the viability of satellite transmissions, Koelle said, that type of a system is a long way off. For now, he said, long-range radio transmissions are state of the art.

But last week a system using cellular technology stirred interest at the International Security Conference in Anaheim.

A Los Angeles company, Cellularm Inc., displayed a system that uses a network of cellular repeater boxes to relay radio transmissions between the user and the central station where the alarm system is monitored.

The company already has 15 of these repeater boxes throughout the Southland. Four of them are on mountain sites above Los Angeles and Pomona, spokesman Michael Harson said.

Beunk said the cellular system may ultimately provide the best alternative to telephone communication systems.

The problem, he said, is that the system is dependent on a dense network of relay boxes, and it will be some time before the system can compete with the vast network of telephone lines. Each relay box has a transmitting range of 30 to 40 miles.

“The industry is committed to the use of telephone company communication for a long time,” Beunk said.