Archbishop Wood High School first to use artificial intelligence technology to detect guns

Warminster, Pa. (WTXF) - Archbishop Wood High School in Warminster is the first to use artificial intelligence technology to detect guns.

"It'll automatically call police if the administration wants it to. It comes in and you see it and you can click on the video," said Christopher Ciabarra. He's describing a new technology that's based on artificial intelligence. He and Lisa Falcone are the inventors of Athena. They say it's the first A.I. security cameras used to detect guns in schools. On Wednesday, he demonstrated how it works using a fake gun.

"Someone pulls out a weapon. Here's the cameras if you look up here. As soon as someone pulls out a weapon you'll get an alert on your phone," said Ciabarra. The demonstration took place at Archbishop Wood High School in Warminster. It's the first school to use the technology.

"We just take a box which is our A.I. box and plug it into their network it talks to all the cameras in their network and it just starts looking for weapons automatically in real time," he said.

The weapon has to be drawn or at least visible to be detected.

The Athena system can notify 9-1-1, police directly and school administration as soon as a weapon is detected depending on how the school has it set up.

"All these school shootings were happening and we got to do something about it," said Ciabarra. Gary Zimmaro is the president of the school. With 32 cameras already posted around the building he says this system is another layer of security to help them be proactive.

"We never want it to happen. It's sad when it happens in another school or anywhere for that matter and hopefully we'll never have to use it but it's here and helping to protect our kids," said Zimmaro.

The school got the program using a grant for Pennsylvania schools that want to beef up security. They've been using it here for about a month.