Security at Toulouse

[John C]

It seems that all the efforts in Toulouse to ensure security fell apart after the first two days, all the people on the entrances and exits to the players area were just for show, as people were still able to get in, steal things and get out again.

I was playing with a novice team, there was only seven of us, we do not have spare markers or people to watch our kit.

After qualifying for the semi finals we all realised we hadn't eaten anything for about 24 hours so off we went for lunch.

We came back to find only six guns in our safe area, someone had taken an LCD 2003 which was covered in our teams stickers.

When we reported this to the organisers it was clear that other guns had also been taken and their attitude was 'that sucks for you'.

Our team captain made the excellent suggestion of moving all the teams in the finals to one aisle of the players area and put security on each end of the aisle but at first this was ignored.

Soon after one of the HPAC girls was pickpocketed, thats just f*cking blatant.
I tell you now if this guy was cought, he may not have been alive by the time he was handed to the organisers!

Finally when one of Dynasty has his bag nicked, containing all his money passport and gear they decided to do what we suggested.

Thats 'closing the door after the horse has bolted' as my Dad would say.

Its not nice either to know that your hard earned playing gear is expendable but when a team who gets everything for free has their stuff taken they suddenly take it seriously.

Also from speaking to other teams who have played in France before (Pulsion I think) this type of thing is par for the course in any French tournament, had we been warned about this maybe we could have saved ourselves a months wages and got someone to look after our kit.

Thanks to HPAC for looking after our gear at the end, we really didnt want to leave anything behind and were considering pulling out of the finals cos we didnt want to leave our kit (wallets passports spares) unattended.

I know it wont happen, but if the responsibility for our markers lay with the organisers, ie if a marker is taken THEIR insurance pays for it.
Then im sure the security would be alot better than it was.

As it stood the organisers were just going through the motions security wise, anyone could have stolen anything, with all the public about it is a suprise only a few markers were stolen!!!

 

[fred1]

F-ing sux that all there is to say, and it sux a lot more considering that when one of your guys get something stolen everyone is like **** happens but when one of the D-Boys gets his kit stolen, the promoters are ready to move heaven and earth to make sure it doesn't happen again.... thats a big error on the part of the promoters.... but I must say there is something about VIPs and Toulouse. Last year the organisation tried to kick everybody out of one of the central seating areas on the main fields so that they could sit a couple VIPs there.... that ain't right. Luckily there was a group of no nonsense british oldschool that nicely told them to go get...... so I got to watch the finals after all

It was me guesting for Pulsion that told you about this "French phenomenon" and actually it's not part of all French tournaments, its a result of french social issues and delinquency problems. French cities have mad delinquency issues which is why the french are always wary, cause they have to deal with this on a daily basis. The French guys I play with never leave the markers unattended. They will leave paint and bags with tools and accessories, but no markers, and especially no bags containing passports and wallets.

 

[MrDan]

I know its not likely that we'll see this gat again, but just so everyone knows, it was a dust (matt) blue, 2003 Angel LCD, theres not many of these about!

The gun was complete with Angel AIR and stickers saying 'Kamikazzee UK' although these are very easily removable.


Hi Fred, thanks for the advice, we've learnt our lesson. Thanks for the game, that was a close one, but you guys deserved it!

 

[fred1]

I don't know..... from what I saw from the dead box I'd say it was pretty lucky......

Later...

 

[Matski]

Fabrice Halmone (tonton/toulouse) has a hardened hatred for gypsies from his homeland, nuff said.

Many insurance companies will insure pball gear, stuff like passports should be left in hotel safes......imo

 

[John C]

Our guy has insurance.

But to claim he needs a crime number.

Laurent told him where the police station was but it was closed (Lazy *******s).

We didnt get a crime number but he is phoning the embassy to see what we can sort out.



What a pile of bollox.



PS Fred I suppose it was a good game. I was watching from the other dead box.

Must have been good for the crowd to watch that one

 

[Superflyuk]

sad to see this sort of thing, our stuff in the 1st two days was alright as loads of people around but something HAS to be done.

instead to having a huge fenced off area with about 10% of it being the staging area why didn;t they have fencing around the players, toilet and score board area. Thus the 3/4 people looking at player passes can see most of the staging area.

at toulose cud have the fance from top of that hill, down behind the crono area, back behind the fill station and back around behind toilets and score boarad and back to top of lil hill - less chance of non wanted peeps getting in

 

[Claudio]

they have fencing around the players, toilet and score board area

Maybe they managed to avoid people steal the only TP roll for the 12 toilets

 

[Superflyuk]

lol - nah the toilets and score board was right next to the players area. as in players only socre board and toilets. The were of course a score board and toilets for public

 

[dicky]

what got me was they let people out of the fenced area with guns and bags who were clearly not players.

i was a guest with kellys and on a few ocassions i carried there spare guns to the fields for them and the people who checked passes didnt raise an eybrow to me bearing in mind i was in normal clothes