helicopper

Bail is not punitive and not a reflection on the police or anyone who lives in the Hudson Valley. Don't confuse bail with fines/penalties; they are apples and oranges.

I'm pretty sure that had it not been a simulated amputated arm it would have been treated much more quickly. As for your comments about sloppy and disorganized, were you at the "hotwash" this evening to share these comments/concerns with the people responsible for an airport response? By what standard are you measuring the response and how many of these exercises have you been to as a reference? If you don't like the mug, you didn't have to take it. I have lots of thoughts about the exercise and shared some of them tonight at the hotwash and will share others with the evaluation team and exercise designers. How about trying to be constructive yourself?

Exactly, if he or the officer was injured it would have further delayed the game and baseball games are long enough! Thank you. This is exactly what the Taser is for. It is a less-lethal force option and was used to control someone who was resisting arrest and ignoring lawful orders to stop. There are use of force policies (SOP/SOG) and they are reviewed regularly so the other member's call for a meaningful review is already being done. Are there abuses? Yes, there are and they should be dealt with. Just like other abuses should be dealt with. The Taser is one of the most benign options in the law enforcement arsenal, IMHO. Yeah, and I'll quit telling you how to do it when you get it right!!!

It was a verbal to an officer detailed to Times Square for a suspicious vehicle or car fire (depends on which source you listen to). The officer looked into the vehicle saw IED components and banged the gong for a full response. You're absolutely right about dispatch information. 911 calls reporting a "smoking car" might have gotten an FD response or a tow truck for a possible overheat!!! This is one BIG reason to improve the training and compensation for dispatchers (and in systems that have them, call-takers).

You're absolutely right that there are too many ways to be killed in these lines of work and our enemies (whomever they may be) are trying to be more creative. I just want to rebut part of your statement. The first arriving officer undoubtedly saved lives - not supposedly. Someone had to be the first (and hopefully last) person to see the suspicious device up close and personally. Had the officer not been diligent by examining the vehicle it could have been the first arriving FD companies opening up a vehicle fire only to be met with exploding propane/gasoline/etc. Someone always has to be the first one through the door or the first one into harm's way and taking decisive action to mitigate the situation. In this case, it has a happy ending. Nobody was hurt, no property was damaged, and the psychological impact is minimal. This should serve as a reminder to everyone not to be complacent and to give every call with your full attention!

Date: 04/29/10 Time: 2320 Location: Roof of 240 S 7th Avenue Frequency: MVPD Units Operating: MVPD patrol, ESU, K-9, DD, NYPD ESU with Air Bag, EMS Weather Conditions: clear and cool Description Of Incident: Male on roof of 10 story apartment building threatening suicide. MVPD attempting to negotiate him off the roof. NYPD Truck 4 enroute with airbag. Reporters: Writer: Chris192 0030 - Airbag deployed by NYPD ESU. 0233 - ESU reports jumper in custody. EMS requested to roof with reeves stretcher. Great job by MVPD to get him off the roof safely and without injury or incident!

The police and fire departments are facing devastating cuts (91 in the PD and 44 in the FD as of now). I think it is safe to say that this will result in demotions (again) and other reassignments.

There is another thread here on EMTBravo with a link to the County GIS viewer that has layers for Fire and EMS districts and stations. It won't help with PAR or SSM units but it will give you all the stations and the agency jurisdiction. That should give you most of what you're looking for.

"Picked on"? I don't know about picked on and I don't know whether examples are good or bad but we discuss things that happen in agencies around the area and beyond. We are public agencies and there's no hiding from the public eye (here or elsewhere).

EMSer, you above assert that there is specific reference in the Constitution that makes it second fiddle to another set of laws or some other document. I contend that the Constitution makes no such reference and respectfully request that you cite the source to support your claim. If you can't cite the source(s) to support this argument, please don't continue telling us what the "law" is.

The odds of that are slim since they're using a rifle at a distance of about 20 feet and have firearms training (this is not their first time).

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When you take one short phrase out of it's context to suit a particular position it is very misleading. "Under God" was only added to the pledge of allegiance in 1950's and I think the final phrase is more relevant to this discussion. Not being a theology major, I'll just make this point - virtually every religion condones the use of a death penalty. That said one does not need to be an aetheist to be a police officer or a soldier, you just have to be able to look at the "greater good". Let's not be so judgmental of each other or our armed forces and law enforcement.

Not a single quote from the above list is from the Constitution. You were asked to quote the Constitution where you assert that it says it is second fiddle to religion. Your views are commendable but your condemnation of police officers is not. How can you judge someone for something without any understanding of what it is that they are doing?

And on the subject of thermal imaging cameras, what training does anyone have in identifying a human target with them? They're great and used frequently for finding fires but has anyone actually gone out and practiced with one to find a person? There are many variables that can make it difficult to discern a human under the best of circumstances and when do we ever get to operate with them?

Very interesting and timely topic! There are many variables that have to be considered by law enforcement regarding searches for missing persons. For example, the age, physical and mental condition of the mission, circumstances of their disappearance (child or elderly wandered away, suspicious circumstances, etc.), time since they were seen last, weather conditions, time of day, clothing worn by the subject, has this ever happened before, etc. etc. etc. How do you manage the resources and maintain accountability of fire personnel in this situation. I can think of at least one incident where I was asked to respond not to search for a missing person but to search for missing/lost rescuers. What training, if any, do fire departments provide their members for this activity? Just out of curiosity, why should first-line fire apparatus be taken out of service for a missing person search? Besides the PD/FD, there are also civilian Search and Rescue organizations in our area, the Civil Air Patrol was already mentioned (though they probably won't use planes for this search unless there is a specific reason too), and of course you've got K-9 assets (a variety of types), aviation, ATV's, thermal imagers, etc. OK, now in keeping with the scenario based discussions - You're doing a search for a missing 6 year old and there are several bodies of water in the area - do you call for divers/boats right away? Let's add to the complexity of the incident and say that a K-9 tracks right to the shore of a lake and the track is lost. Now what?

Amtrak has a pretty big presence in the Baltimore / Washington DC area and they do wander north and south from there. I don't think they're up here in the NY area as often because their trains operate on the MTA tracks and MTA has a PD.

What do you mean the timing? We've been around for 15 years; we're not something new. I think I'm missing your point.

Interesting perspective. There are no state police aircraft on Long Island so the only option would be from Newburgh. The State Police mission priority is medevacs so they're configured and staffed for that; we're staffed primarily for law enforcement and light search and rescue. We are the only aviation resource in Westchester County so you can't call that a duplication of resources. By this I mean we are paid for and serve the residents of Westchester County, not NYC, not Long Island or anywhere else. If the County Administration did away with our unit and relied upon NYC it wouldn't be "mutual" aid, would it? NYPD would be using its resources to serve Westchester County, where's the logic in that for the NYPD? Even now, when there could conceivably be reciprocal assistance, the NYPD does not routinely come up to Westchester except for their air-sea-rescue mission or unusual incidents. Regarding these tough economic times, we've had our budget "adjusted" (read cut) accordingly and are always subject to scrutiny to insure that our operations are valued by the local communities and most important cops on the ground. Despite the perception to the contrary, use of aviation in law enforcement can be very cost-effective.

Was that the maroon Nissan or Toyota? Yup, it's already been checked. It was stolen but nobody wants to haul the wreck out of there so I guess it will be there until it rots. Before O-wind jumps on me about this, it has been updated as recovered in NYSPIN already. There were a couple of other old wrecks back in there along the power line right of way but I think the accessible ones have been removed. It had to be pretty funny when the kid went home and told dad that the car was two miles off the road stuck on a rock.

We didn't, you keep calling NYPD.

Hmmm... Let's see, we can have 59 different people doing 59 different things or we can have some standardization so things are more efficient and less confusing. Yes, individual fire districts bear responsibility for their operations but there can still be standardized dispatch and communications policies so everyone knows and understands what's going on without needing a secret decoder ring. And, no disrespect to fire commissioners and/or chiefs, what happens when what they decide isn't best or current or consistent with everyone else? We just ignore the disparity and hope for the best? Come on, we have to get out of this mindset that everyone is their own little empire. If an agency wants to use soup cans and string for communications fine, but if they're a signatory to the mutual aid plan or have any intentions of giving/receiving mutual aid to/from someone else they should become part of the system and that's where we're really lacking in this part of the country.

Ding Ding Ding... Here's a good one, we can't even standardize dispatch procedures for consistent and standard communications in the County. Is it any wonder things are so screwed up?

How about the 4th Alarm on Elliott Avenue just a couple of weeks ago? If it weren't for the fast response of the currently understaffed YFD, it could have been a whole block that went! No matter which two houses they close, the residents of Yonkers will suffer. On the police side, they're already feeling the affects of the cuts to special details like bike and foot patrols. Robberies and assaults are way up and it will only get worse. Perhaps the mayor should downsize the staff in City Hall?

These are all the comments by the person in question. I don't think it is paid vs. volunteer as much as misguided/uninformed about survivor benefits. And don't get yourself all worked up about an anonymous post in a newspaper blog, it's just another anonymous comment by someone uninformed. Nothing to lose sleep over. As for respect, there is precious little respect for any of us in any emergency service right now and we have to work to earn it, not demand it or expect it.