Week 10—Recruit Magor

 Week 10 presented a tough test; however, the class did very well. The scenario days continue to be my favorite. I have always learned best by doing things rather than sitting in class. We had two scenario days, report writing and arrest control. 

For the scenario days, we concentrate on the task at hand. So for report writing we try getting all the correct information for our report. During arrest control we focus on good fundamentals of our arrest techniques.

During report writing we learned what the real world is like while we write our reports. Instructors brought in their radios and turned the volume up. While trying to write our report we had other calls that we had to respond to and handle and then return to our report. We learned that if you choose to write your report right after the incident we may be leaving one of our partners alone at a different call.

During Arrest Control and Tactics scenarios, my form and fundamentals went out the door. It is funny how during “practice” I can do most tactics very well but when you add in a little stress and a mouthy suspect, things change.

Communication is also very important during these scenarios. For example, at one point Recruit Seyfried and I looked at each other while dealing with a resisting suspect and said “forward takedown” we immediately did our forward takedown and got the suspect on the ground and handcuffed. It worked out very nicely.

Thursday we got to do a firearms drill where we had threats we had to stop. The “threats” were small steel plates spray painted white. We had to run up a big hill and then had three stations where we were forced to take cover and stop the threats. One scenario was a hostage situation, where about 6 inches was visible on the target and the remainder was covered by an innocent civilian.  It was reassuring stopping that threat.