Fresno Police Department Relies on Tactical Training Systems Sniper Tower and Tactical House

Advantages of Customized Training

According to Hoagland, the best feature of the sniper tower is the ability for operators to prone out by using the garage-like doors on the second story to replicate several different shooting engagement scenarios such as elevated positions.

“The tac house’s best feature is the ability to move walls to create an entirely different floor plan,” says Hoagland, who serves as a SWAT Team Leader. “Often in other structures, once an officer or team trains at that location one time, by the end of the day they memorize the floor plan. After that any training is not as beneficial, because it’s not an ‘unknown’ situation.

520+ Agencies Use Training Center

As a regional training center, the Fresno operation gets students from both throughout the state of California and nationwide.  

“We generally see around 500 different agencies represented throughout the year training here,” says Hoagland. “Our tac house is used in nearly all of our exercise or tactical proficiency classes. That structure takes a beating.”

Classes taught at the tac house include Active Shooter Response, Search Warrant Execution, Tactical Deployments, K9 Operations, Breaching, Basic Interior Searching, Low Light/No Light, Patrol Rifle, Force-On-Force Scenarios, Critical Incident Articulation, Undercover Operations, and many more.

The facility is also rented to allied agencies that conduct their own training. In addition, the Fresno Police Department has contracts with more than 20 different law enforcement agencies that use the tac house and sniper tower. These agencies include Fresno County Sheriffs, Fresno County Probation, the FBI, HSI, DOJ, ATF, California Dept. of Corrections, and the U.S. Military (specifically the California Air National Guard).

Training Day and Night

With training underway a majority of the days in Fresno, Hoagland relates that nighttime training is also offered. “Night training offers a unique perspective and different tactical problems due to low light/no light situations,” says Hoagland. “No matter what the lighting situation is, the Tactical Training Systems facilities provide our team members with as realistic a training experience as it can be, considering the added impact of force-on-force, breachable and reusable doors, etc.

“Without a doubt, the tac house from Tactical Training Systems that we have is one of the most important assets in our training program.”

Made of all-American steel, the only unanticipated drawback Hoagland has experienced with the tac house and sniper tower comes with the changing climate in To combat the situation, and even make it work as a training exercise, swamp coolers and ventilation systems are being added to the structures. This will provide for more training time inside the buildings. Another enhancement being made includes the addition of fire alarms and speaker systems to simulate a more stressful environment for specific train evolutions. Finally, 2x4s and plywood have been added in certain areas to increase the sturdiness of temporary walls during training.

“We’re always thinking of ways to creatively enhance the training experience,” says Hoagland. “Tactical Training Systems has provided us with two great base structures that are holding up exceptionally well. When we come up with unique improvements to ‘change up’ the training experience, then we all win.”

Based in Sun Prairie, Wisc., Tactical Training Systems relies on the expertise of our in-house engineers, military experience of employees and support of our sister company, Fire Facilities, Inc.. Our parent company, Trachte Building Systems, is one of the largest and oldest manufacturers of steel self-storage systems in the industry.  For more information, visit www.tacticaltrainingsystems.com or call 1-800-929-3726.