'Securing Our Citizens' Future by Promoting Human Prosperity, Energy Security and Environmental Sustainability' was the theme at last month's Fifth Summit of the Americas (V-SOA) held in Trinidad and Tobago, a twin-island state just north of Venezuela. In the interest of bridging communication and security, AVW-TELAV Audio Visual Solutions was contracted to provide audio visual and simultaneous interpretation equipment to the meetings, events and Media Centre.

The SOA brings together the 34 democratically-elected heads of state and government in the western hemispheres that are members of the Organization of the American States. These Summits take place every three to four years to exchange ideas and opinions on political, economic, social and security challenges confronting the region.

A fully-loaded cargo aircraft with over 35,000 kg of equipment left our Montreal branch on April 1st, destined for the Caribbean, and returned on April 24th, 2009. Some of the major items being transported included 30 simultaneous interpretation booths, 205 Brahler digimic microphones, 2700 Brahler and Williams Sound wireless interpretation receivers, two Digico D1 Live digital audio boards, one Meyer Line Array system, eight Midas Venice analogue boards, two Barco Encore video processing racks and control units, as well as 18 Canon VC-C4 remote-controlled cameras!

AVW-TELAV provided simultaneous interpretation and audio visual for media feeds and coverage within 10 rooms in four languages. We also provided equipment for:

•All the events in the country's flagship conference centre, Hyatt Regency, including the Opening Ceremony, Luncheon, Official Dinner and Plenary;
•The Retreat and Closing Ceremony at the Diplomatic Center;
•Similar events on the Carnival Victory and Caribbean Princess cruise ships for Youth, Private Sector and Civil Society;
•As well as the Spouses' programme; the First Minister's Meeting; and the Coordinators' Meeting.

Projects of this magnitude frequently pose interesting challenges, and V-SOA was no exception. For example, on the cruise ships, AVW-TELAV had to run audio and video cables from one deck to the other, but for security reasons, cables passing through doors needed to be quickly disconnected in case of an emergency. "Using CAT5 type cables for audio and video allowed us to make disconnect points with standard RJ45 connectors and reduced the overall installation time frame," explained Henry Derix, Director, Technical Development.

Here's some feedback from the partners we worked with to make the conference a success:

"AVW-TELAV is motivated, friendly and extremely professional company to work with. Their preparation and solutions to facilitate audio and lighting for the V-SOA were above expectation. It was a pleasure working with them, and the two companies worked well together. We would definitely like to be working with AVW-TELAV again in November for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) event."

-Representative from GlobeCast, the leading global provider of content management and worldwide transmission services for professional broadcast delivery


"My experience with AVW-TELAV was a positive one, in which they were always willing to assist, even when requests came to them at the last minute. I had two such cases of impromptu requests, and they handled both well, in spite of being stretched with equipment and manpower. Also, there was always at least one person with whom I could be in contact to check on arrangements, which laid the basis for a good working relationship all round."

-Ana Lisa Jones Reis, Conference Specialist, National Secretariat, V-SOA


"Excellent sound system. There were no problems that could not have been adjusted right away, since they supplied us with relevant personnel at all times. The equipment worked well on the buses and on the tours. AVW-TELAV made time to meet with the programme coordinators, conducted the relevant site visits and made sound recommendations. They assisted by providing drawings for the rooms to scale."

-Zyda Mohammed- Jimdar, Spouses' Programme, which is made up of the spouses of some of the leaders attending V-SOA that have committed themselves to working towards creating a cleaner and greener environment