The Boston Marathon is getting a security upgrade with an increase in the number of eyes watching video feeds from surveillance cameras. Ten different agencies will be involved in security for the entire 26.2-mile marathon route April 21. New security cameras were recently installed.

What’s new and different that has Massachusetts leading the country is that the cameras along the route are all connected.

“We’re taking feeds from all of the various public agencies that have a major role in the marathon and bringing that into one system,” said Randy Clarke, MBTA director of security.

Images will feed in real-time into eight command centers in a connected network that did not exist last year.

In the search for suspects in the days after the bombings at the 2013 marathon, the FBI had to collect and screen thousands of images from a variety of sources before they were able to identity Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Clarke said that comparing results from examination of images by different agencies took time in a situation where every second counted.

The new system is believed to be the first in the country for an event like the marathon.

It was put in place on a smaller scale for last year’s Fourth of July celebration on the Esplanade.

”Everyone that is going to participate in the marathon this year, both runners and spectators, should know every public agency is working as close as possible to really make this the safest event […]