Police at Berlin’s fan festival have been testing a new device designed to detect chemical and biological threats — giving it a dress rehearsal for the World Cup final.
The 70kg portable device, named Sigis 2, can detect 200 different chemical compounds from a distance of 5km.
”It’s really doing a job tonight [Tuesday] but it is also a practice for the final,” said Lars Haase, a chemical engineer for the Berlin police’s forensic department.
About a million people gathered on the capital’s ”Fan Mile” on Tuesday to watch as Germany lost to Italy 2-0 in the semifinals, played in Dortmund. The capital will host the final on Sunday.
The device is designed to detect any substances as soon as they are released — alerting officials to evacuate the public. How much time a chemical would take to travel 5km would depend on the wind and other weather conditions.
”It can take just one minute or half an hour,” Haase said. ”It could be difficult to evacuate all the people here quickly, but at least we would know what the substance was.”
The device’s catalogue of substances can be updated. At the fan festival, it has detected perfume — but it cannot make out sweat.
”So far we haven’t detected anything we didn’t want to,” Haase said.
The device, which uses so-called Fouier Transform Infrared Reflectance technology, based on detecting tiny differences in temperature — was created by the University of Hamburg and was unveiled in February.
Four of the machines are in use in Germany. Haase said authorities in Stuttgart and Hamburg also have used them during the World Cup. ‒ Sapa-AP