Stopping Tunnels?

[koholos]

So, I had a guard patrolling around the outside of my prison, to watch for prisoners trying to tunnel out. And a prisoner tunneled out, literally while he had turned to the other end of his patrol routine. And the idiot guard didn't even bother trying to catch him!

So, how do I stop the prisoners from getting out? Because that makes me angry.

[Proteus]

Prisoners tunnel in their cells during the night, usually from their toilets.
Just patrol your cell blocks and check out those prisoners who, despite hours of sleep, still have a full sleep need bar.

Also put a large fence around your estate ... fences don´t cost any money, just time for your workers to erect them, so you can make the fences as large and complex as you wish

[GC13]

Once the prisoner is outside your walls, catching them is dicey. You'll want at least six squares of concrete between them and dirt—that should buy you two nights if you're lucky. Outside, make sure there's a large fenced-in area: as Proteus said, the fences are free. Do cell block searches every day until you stop finding tunnels, then do them periodically.

[Ramp[GER]]

Patrols dont prevent tunneling at all. In fact there is no way to stop tunneling at all, but
here are my tips to make it harder (take longer) for prisoners

1. dont have cells at the edge of your prison (they are tunneling faster throught dirt than concrete floor/walls. So have as much concrete between them and freedom as possible.)

2. Do searches of cell blocks (NOT prisoners, they dont like it) every 3 days at least. you can also search only toilets, while they are sleeping

3. In the morning, short time before they wake up, look into needs of Prisoners. If Sleep demand is high there is a high chance they didnt sleep but tunnel during night. If so instant search of cell. (works very well, but is a bit of work in a big prison)

4. have fences at the very edge of the map, so there is a long way to tunnel and fences are free to build.

Since I use this tips not a single prisoners broke out of my prison. If they tunnel I catch them after max. 5 meters.

PS:

Oh and use metal detectors to find tools early. In your prison policy click on "Search Cell" if a tool was found

[koholos]

Originally posted by dierampe:

Patrols dont prevent tunneling at all. In fact there is no way to stop tunneling at all, but
here are my tips to make it harder (take longer) for prisoners

I don't want to use patrols to stop tunneling, but I DO expect a patrol to at least warn others/chase the escaper. The fact that he didn't is what made me angry in the first place.

3. In the morning, short time before they wake up, look into needs of Prisoners. If Sleep demand is high there is a high chance they didnt sleep but tunnel during night. If so instant search of cell. (works very well, but is a bit of work in a big prison)

In the morning, nothing. This guy escaped at 3 AM on the first night I'd opened the prison for prisoners.

4. have fences at the very edge of the map, so there is a long way to tunnel and fences are free to build.

This might work, though it does feel a bit cheap.

[GC13]

Originally posted by koholos:

In the morning, nothing. This guy escaped at 3 AM on the first night I'd opened the prison for prisoners.

Then that was a very flawed prison design. Even in my prison where I goofed and forgot to add in a fence I meant to, it was still daylight by the time the prisoner escaped.

Did you send your prisoners to bed early, or something? Because I think my guy's path to freedom was as short as possible. He only needed to dig through the toilet, one wall square, and a square of dirt.

[Bomb Ninja]

I just do i shakedown every night. Works for me and by the time im done the prisoners are happy again. Just make sure to do it as soon as they fall asleep if you have alot of prisoners. I rarely get tunnels and if i do they are a few blocks long and dont make it out.

[Shieltar]

the speed at which prisoners manage to tunnel is excessive. they manage months worth of tunneling in a few hours (game time)

about 60% of the budget goes on filling in tunnels. I cant build anything because I'm forever spending all my money on fixing up the cells I've already got.

[Bomb Ninja]

I only spend about $500 max (usually alot less) on tunnel repairs. Just do shakedowns every night. If you have a good regime set up they will calm down by morning and not riot, or cause trouble.
This is with 78 prisoners and 12 guards.

[Proteus]

I have to agree on the usefulness of shakedowns.
I do them every 1-2 days.
And I have to admit that I never guessed how many contraband the first 2 shakedowns would bring to the light (despite the fact that I have metal detectors and controlled everyone for which the detector would raise an alarm).
Shakedowns are definitely much more thorough than normal searches.

Aside from this I regularly (also around every 1-2 days) do cell block controls while the inmates are in the canteen. often helps in detecting tunnels in cells, whose inmates I didn´t suspect of digging.

The costs of filling tunnels and the likelyhood of inmates digging has decreased a little bit since then

[mikeydsc]

all my hallways are 3 tiles wide but every so often i put in choke points and put metal detectors all over. I would rather spend 10k on metal detectors than keep spending money on repairing tunnels...specially when you have near 100 prisoners.

I still get tunnels but since I also do random searches everyday plus if a prisoner is caught with anything it triggers auto cell block search so I have very rare tunnels anymore

Do not be afraid to use many metals detectors...saves money in long run and choke point the detectors forcing inmates to go thru single file thru one square


****All this does not help if you have too few guards to conduct the searches speedily.****

[Zourin]

Inmates can slip things through metal detectors at an alarming rate. Even with a choke point at the cantina and cell blocks (around 6+ checks per day), you're still going to get tunnels.

Once you get policy, set every infraction as an automatic body/cell search. This will catch most of your issues before they can breach a perimeter fence. And ALWAYS have that perimeter fence at the map edges.

[76561198100945093]

put a metal detector so they wont get any tools in there cellblock put one in the hallway or the door of the canteen or workshop

[DominusInferos]

my solution is simple yet expensive, 10 man cell blocks with a guard patroling each block and metal detectors at the entrance to each block. the patroling guard handles the search if the prisoner is dinged at the entrance to the block making for a very fast response time.

[Maverick]

Put perimeter walls near the building where your prisoners are, they avoid perimeter walls so they will take the longer route delaying their escape, meanwhile search the cells every 2-3 days

[billy]

Tunneling seems a bit too prevalant. I wasnt aware there was a fence you could build for free, i was saving up to put a big perimeter fence round my prison.