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Police Armed Response Forum Thread, driving standards in Close Protection World Area; interested in finding out what standard of driving is required for arv crews in other police forces- any info appreciated....
I believe you need to complete an advanced Driving Course. You would then have a further course during your firearms training to teach things like hard stops and handling differences between soft and armoured vehicles.
ARV's where I work are used as traffic cars until an incident occurs which requires them to act.
Ideally 2 of the crew of 3 should be advanced drivers, The Metropolitan Police crew their ARV's with crews of 3 where alot of county forces only employ 2 officers per vehicle. Even if you are not an advanced driver, on attending an ARV course you will drive and practice the tactics. Met ARV's do not do traffic they are solely employed as ARVs, of which their are 14 of them between 0800 and 0200, they also have standing authority to be armed whilst on duty, which only several forces employ. Most other forces rely on their command rooms to authorise them to arm. This in my opinion is outdated and should be changed. The Met Firearms Department deal with around 15000 spontanious armed incidents (for half of these, no or little action is taken by the ARV crews) and 2500 pre-planned operations a year.
Hope this answers your questions
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Hampshire go double-crewed but have a higher than national average investment in dricer (dricer? driver) training hence do not automaticaly recognise other driving courses. This causes some problems for transferees who are generally rated as 'basic' until it has been considered. Some, I know, just haven't been able to carry their skills over at all and have had to wait to do the Hampshire courses, which is annoying for ARV work.
Northumbria CSU, double crewed and all advanced drivers, therefore like traffic rats are allowed to pursue, others on borough are standard response and can only follow. Now in the real world whats the difference
I can't understand how most forces 2 crew their ARV's, on a busy day its manic, dealing with the comms and map reading.
My busiest day on the ARV's, 1400hrs deployed down to South Norwood and detained 3 armed robbers, redeployed to Hayes West London to intercept other armed robbers coming into London from Thames Valley who were being followed by the Flying Squad, numerous non compliant stops initiated on vehicles in Hayes and persons detained. A number of armed dig outs were then initiated in West London by all the ARVs in London. Redeployed to hostage situation in Southall, once completed redeployed to more armed dig outs concerned in the Thames Valley armed robberies. 11pm get our first brew. These were the times when there was only about 8 ARV's on shift for London.
This was a very busy day, and is the subject of an excellent story involving one of the crews, but i couldn't have imagined doing this day in just a 2 crewed ARV.
In Sussex all ARV crews are advanced drivers. With regards to numbers, marked ARVs have 2 officers in (AFOs). Duty teamleader patrols 3 up in an unmarked car (SFOs).
Although each vehicle still has East/West Sussex map books - TFU, RPU and some GP vehicles have Garmin SatNav systems - much easier (when they work)
Last edited by nobbynobbs; 03-03-2008 at 09:45 AM.
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In answer to CO19 "i cant understand how forces only double crew their ARV blah blah" - They dont have the resources! Simple as that. Yes it may make good tactical sense for a 3 man (sorry "person") crew but there are not enough authorised officers to do so and maintain 24 hour coverage. The busy day you describe i am sure is typical but hey London is one of the best and largest Capital cities in the world with 10,000,000 people so thats about right and after all youve got all thos PSCO's to help you now, do they carry Glocks or prefer just the taser!
Currently, London is swamped with Armed Police. The 19 cars have to battle with "ARV" cars from the DPG and the Airport (it's a bit like being in the TA...not actually doing the job properly, but getting all the kit) when there is a call. It can be as manic as is described above, but so not often. Mind you, I wouldn't trade it for anything. I still start to grin when the lights and horns go on, and I'm old enough to have got it out of my system.
And the alternative (punting a panda around Peckham) is too dreadfull to comprehend.
Okay, I'll just finish this pint and have a jog around the block, otherwise I'll never pass that fitness test.
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driving standards
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