Urban Shield 2011

A hearty congratulation to all participants and volunteers of this years’ Urban Shield exercise.   Your dedication to excellence is truly commendable and it was an honor to be among your teams in action once again. 

Since its inception in 2007 Adamson Police Products has been a major sponsor and equipment provider for Urban Shield.  We have been very active in planning,  exhibiting,  providing new equipment training and evaluation of a great variety of technologies for these events.   Being an active conduit between manufacturers and ‘boots on the ground’  operators has been a huge learning experience for us and is a unique perspective simply unavailable in any other venue.

Here are a few pictures from my perspective as the event progressed.   First is the Colt Challenge which took place on signup/new equipment day.  Note the new Colt LE6901 7.62 caliber rifles in action.

I ran preliminary range briefings,  then teams moved downrange under the guidance of Colts’ Doug Campbell and David Ridley where they performed various drills,  then the challenge itself,  shooting for the prize (a $5K custom Colt weapon package). 

Also from Colt was the LE6940 monolithic upper receiver carbine and the tiny,  yet powerful SCC (subcompact carbine) and the new SP6940P Advanced Piston System carbine .   

Colt Sub Compact Weapon SCW
Colt Advanced Law Enforcement Carbine
Colt Advanced Piston System
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Following that are pictures where I was positioned at the Novartis parking garage scenario.  This scenario required teams to move in on a chemical attack and required them to have members don their Level 3/C PPE (Personal Protective Ensemble) which this year included the lightweight Blauer XRT suit,  the AVON Protection FM53 facepiece and EZ-Air tactical blower.  (note how incredibly small the EZ-air unit is in the photos).   This combination of gear was very well received and many teams raved about the high-mobility of the suits and the fog-free operation of the mask and blower.  

Note: the PPE should include a specific specially rated pathogen/chemical and puncture resistant boot which unfortunately was not practical for the event (footwear has to be specifically sized of course).   As an FYI the certification boot is the finely crafted German-made Haix Airpower R1 or R2.  Keep an eye on this blog as I write a review on Haix boots in the near future. 

Here are links to the manufacturers:
http://www.blauer.com/chembio-microsite/
http://www.avon-protection.com/Law%20Enforcement/fm53.htm
http://www.haix-bootstore.com/rescue-station-boots





 

…When the dust settled this year’s top 3 winners were Israel’s Yamam,  Oakland SWAT and FBI SWAT.  Huge congratulations to these top-tier heros!

If your agency would like a live demo of any of these technologies,  please call or email and we’ll see you soon.

Be safe

London Lewis