Police & Security Expo 2008

Last week I had the pleasure of traveling to Atlantic City, New Jersey (for the first time ever in my life) to attend, and work at, the Police & Security Expo. Arriving the day before the "show" floor opened I got to set up the Cygnus booth and take my time walking around the expo floor seeing what various vendors were going to be showing off. By the time the show floor opened the next morning I knew exactly what I wanted to see. Thankfully, it was what Cygnus (Officer.com) wanted me to see.

One of the busiest booths was BAE Systems. Now owning a number of well known companies in the law enforcement industry, BAE's "booth" was actually (I think) about the size of six (maybe eight?) regular sized booths. In that area was Safariland, Hatch, Savvy Body Armor, Hiatt (handcuffs), First Intercom, ProTech armor and more. Some of the highlights were:

• Safariland has a new platform for their holsters and accessories that is fully MOLLE compatible.
• Hatch (which is forty years old now) had a full line of gloves on display and they were showing off a new design specifically for the needs of K9 handlers.
• Savvy Body Armor is specifically made for female officers but the fact that every vest is custom fit to the officer makes it unique in the armor industry.
• Hiatt handcuffs are now available in different colors and they had a couple of see-through pair to show the inner workings. I learned stuff I never knew about handcuffs before.
• First Intercom was showing off their interoperability system which, if installed, automatically initiates at scenes involving multiple players from the public safety field.
• ProTech Armor was showing off the Titan Assault Vest, specifically designed for the patrol officer responding to an Active Shooter / Immediate Response situation. Well thought out.

Since I'm a motorcycle rider I enjoyed visiting in the BMW Motorcycle booth and the Johnny Pag Motorcycle booth. Both companies had some new bikes to show off and the motorcycles were unique in their own way. I was previously familiar with the BMW bikes but had not heard of Johnny Pag. What I saw was a 300cc bike that gets 65MPG. THAT is easier on the gas budget.

BLACKHAWK! was on hand and I got to talk to them about their Integrated Tourniquet System (ITS) as well as their new cross-draw SERPA holster for the TASER X26 or X26C. The ITS has eight tourniquets in each uniform (four in the pants and four in the shirts), preplaced to be of highest value to today's warrior - whether (s)he is a soldier or law enforcement professional. Designed by an Army Special Forces field surgeon, the ITS has potential to save an awful lot of lives that would normally be lost to extremity bleeding. The SERPA holster for the TASER functions just like their normal SERPA duty holster and will secure the X26/C with or without a cartridge in place.

I-COP was there showing off their in-car video system with a unique intended purpose. NOT just to be used for court evidence, the video system was specifically designed for constant surveillance and analysis to support Community Oriented Policing. That's an interesting concept.

KustomSignal's booth had two interesting pieces of gear. The Raptor RP-1 RADAR system that looks nothing like a conventional RADAR system was on display. Using relatively thin square antennas and a pretty small control head, the Raptor doesn't look like what most motorists expect a RADER unit to look like when mounted in a police vehicle. The other piece of equipment was an on-board video system for motorcycles. With space at a premium, KustomSignal has to find a way to really make the system compact. They did a good job.

L3 had two separate booths. One was dedicated to the EOTech holographic weapon sight system while the other was displaying their Flashback 2 Mobile Video unit. I've long been a fan of the EOTech holoscope and I found something in a different booth that adds to its versatility.