Ambulance Crash Testing

Quite an impressive video of the back of an ambulance during a 50km/h frontal collision. For all those who work in an ambulance, keep your seat belt one for all those simple transports. Obviously during a code or any other job that requires you to move around, that won't be possible. But keep safe and continue saving lives!


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Raw Footage of Bronx FDNY Save

This is a wild video of heroes in action! Its not everyday that you see firefighters and civilians saving someones life like this. Although media may be talking about the civilian being a hero, we must remember that it was both the FDNY and the civilian who saved the boys life. Great job to both!

Whacker Blog Update

Wow! We just realized that our most recent post was in March. Time seems to fly. Well, we are back it. Our hopes are to post at least 2-3 articles per month. This should allow us to keep you informed on what is happening at Whacker as well as keep you up to date on random public safety news and videos. We have some new products which will be released in Q4 of 2009.

We've also added a Twitter page which you can join for updates at Whacker Technologies and Emergency City.

Carbon Motors - First Purpose Built Police Car

Will these make it to mass production? They seem to be built nicely with alot of features typically not available when converted a standard vehicle to a police cruiser. What are your thoughts on this vehicle? Will the E7 be the police car of the future?

Emergency City is Open for Business

We've gone ahead and created a new Whacker store. The new name is Emergency City; a name that reflects our purpose. A one stop shop for emergency products. This isn't an overnight transformation, but we are constantly adding new products and product lines.

Have an product line that you would like us to offer? Send us an email or give us a call.

Are you a government entity looking to purchase with a purchase order? We will continue to process POs in the similar manner as our original online store.

Visit us today to purchase LED light bars, police lights or any type of emergency vehicle lights!

Pimp's Official Whacker Technologies The Ohr + Fury LED Dash Light Reviews

Check out Pimp's official review of the Ohr and the Fury LED dash light: Click here for review

Here is a link to the video: Video of dash lights in action.

Inaugural security plans

By Kevin Johnson
USA Today

WASHINGTON — Record crowds expected for President-elect Barack Obama's inauguration are prompting unique law enforcement strategies, including an unprecedented deployment of technology and a small army of police officers and military personnel, senior security officials say.

"Every element of the plan had to be tweaked to consider crowd control," Washington Police Chief Cathy Lanier says.

The FBI -- worried that crowds will slow responses to potential emergencies -- for the first time is outfitting at least 100 teams of specialists in hazardous materials, weapons of mass destruction and hostage rescue with global positioning devices, said Christopher Combs, an FBI supervisory agent involved in the inaugural security operation.

Supervisors at a local command center will track the teams on large screens so they can be quickly dispatched to possible crises.

A separate cellular telephone network is being tested for use by emergency officials in case existing systems are overloaded, as occurred in the hours after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"One of the reasons the assets required (for this inauguration) have doubled, even tripled is not because of the (terror) threat, but because of the number of people coming," Combs said. "A problem can be magnified 10 times because of the size of the crowd."

John Perren, counterterrorism chief at the FBI's Washington field office, said there are no credible threats against inaugural activities. Yet because of the "anticipated crowd size," he said, it is important for "all of us to be looking at the same sheet of music." District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty and other officials predict crowds will top the record 1.2 million at Lyndon Johnson's inauguration.

Northwestern University professor Hani Mahmassani said he has been advising the district's Metropolitan Police and officials about crowd control strategies. Mahmassani, a civil and environmental engineering professor, has studied crowd behavior and the deadly stampedes that have marred annual Muslim pilgrimages to Mecca.

He said district officials are including various mass communications systems to assist with crowd control, from loud speakers and strategically placed large-screen TVs to cellphone alerts.

"Anything could be a spark," Mahmassani said. "A person falling or tripping," or false information circulated in a crowd. "You try to keep the psychology positive so that no false rumors spread."

A network of surveillance cameras, most of which was installed after the 2001 attacks, will monitor crowd size and movement, he said.

The overall security operation is being overseen by the Secret Service. In the event of a crisis, the FBI would lead the subsequent investigation.

Combs said federal investigators also have digitally mapped the entire Inaugural Parade route, from the U.S. Capitol steps to Pennsylvania Avenue and the White House.

Officials can refer to parade route images, down to the locations of trash cans and light poles, in part to more quickly deploy response units, he said.

The site-survey technology also has included an electronic review of buildings along the parade route and possible locations that could provide vantage points for possible snipers.

The technology has been used before, but Combs said investigators are now able to share the survey information more broadly and quickly than for previous inaugurations.

"The buildup of the public security infrastructure (including security cameras) has made it so much easier," he said. "Connections can be made with a couple clicks of the mouse."

Copyright 2009 USA Today

Departments seek fuel efficient police cars

By Jim Suhr
The Associated Press Writer

CAHOKIA, Ill. — Police Chief Richard Watson admits his department's newest patrol car is a curious departure from its big-horsepower Ford Crown Victorias. But the four-cylinder Pontiac Vibe GT has plenty of pep for policing, he said, and gets twice the gas mileage.

Law enforcement agencies across the country looking for ways to cut corners and reduce costs after last year's $4-a-gallon gas are increasingly turning to more fuel-efficient cars.

While few expect that more muscular cruisers like the Crown Victorias or Dodge Chargers will be replaced altogether, there's little confidence gasoline will stay below $2 a gallon much longer.

"I thought this is the time to do it," Watson said.

In Florida's tiny Gulf Breeze, Police Chief Peter Paulding is pursuing a state grant to replace the internal combustion engines in three of his department's 20 Crown Victorias with electric motors. He wants to see if the greener engines withstand the rigors of police work.

Salt Lake City police recently added five 2009 Toyota Camry hybrids to their fleet, looking to save as much as $20,000 a year. The police chief called the hybrids "necessary" and worth putting through their paces, each decked out with the department's logo and lights.

"To some degree, everybody's looking at alternatives," said Russell Laine, police chief in Algonquin, Ill., and the president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police.

Atlanta-based Carbon Motors Corp. has designed a prototype car it touts as being designed just for police. The angular E7 - nicknamed the "Machine" - evokes images of "Robo Cop." Its bells and whistles include flashers built into the car's body for aerodynamics to the twin-turbo diesel engine said to use 40 percent less fuel than Crown Victorias.

But it's unclear when the E7 might hit the market, if at all. So police are making do, in Watson's case with the Vibe.

Watson might be a guinea pig, of sorts. When he told others at an FBI training program a year ago that he was going to experiment with a more economical patrol car, he was met with raised eyebrows and skeptics aplenty.

"They wanted to get all my statistics once we start running this car and see how it performs and all that," he says. "Nobody wants to jump out there and do it; they don't want to take the effort, time and money."

The Pontiac he settled on has a 2.4-liter engine and gets 21 miles to the gallon in town; he figures that's more than twice the mileage his department's 30 Crown Victorias deliver with their 4.6-liter powerhouses.

He said the Vibe's fuel economy will be logged over the next year or so to determine whether the initiative sinks or swims.

And though the new car required some custom work, including a plexiglass barrier between the driver's compartment and the back seat, the car's total tab of about $24,000 still was slightly cheaper than what a fully, police-equipped Crown Victoria would have cost.

Watson expects the Vibe to do it all - even pursuits, though he figures those don't happen very often in the St. Louis suburb of about 15,000.

"We all anticipate that it'll have great performance. But until you actually test it in real-life conditions, you don't know," said Watson.

In Gulf Breeze, where police overspent their fuel budget by 20 percent last year, Paulding expects to learn next month whether he'll get the grant to retrofit three of his gas-powered police cruisers with electric motors.

Although he's confident the speed and acceleration of the repowered vehicles would pass muster in policing, the bigger question might be how much range the vehicles have on a battery's charge. Paulding says a police cruiser in his city of about 6,000 rolls up 60 to 100 miles on a typical patrol shift.

He says that's possible for an electric-powered car, though the vehicles might be less sensible for state troopers who can log hundreds of miles a day.

"We don't think we're going to be able to get away from gas-powered cars totally," Paulding said. "But we think we could convert at least some of our fleet, and we think that most police departments could convert at least some of their fleet to these electric vehicles."

If it works, Paulding says, the possibilities are endless in a nation with some 15,000 municipal police departments.

"There's an unlimited supply of used police cars," to potentially retool with electric batteries instead of building new cruisers, he says. "The Crown Victoria, for us, is a suitable police car, a suitable platform. If we can retrofit the vehicle power supply as opposed to changing everything, we'd have the performance, the size and be more economical."

That, he thinks, "could be a whole new way of communities fulfilling their transportation needs for their police departments."

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press

Are Ambulance Response Times to Slow?

Having worked in EMS, I know first hand that no matter how efficient an EMS system is, there are times when it will be pushed to the limit and people will have to wait for an ambulance to arrive. The question is: What is the standard? How often should an EMS system (or any public safety agency) be allowed to delay response times? Below is a video that discusses Philadelphia's EMS system and how it is regularly being pushed to the limit. Is this fair to the public for which we are there for?

New Zealand Police Cars get a Makeover - New Look and LED Light Bars

The country's police cars are getting a makeover which will standardise the look of the fleet - and save up to $800,000 in fuel costs each year, police say.

The main features of the makeover include a more consistent look to the livery - the stickers and patterning on the cars - and an LED lightbar which is flatter and brighter than the current rotating lights.

The changes will see a phasing out of the orange and blue which currently differentiates traffic vehicles from frontline and general duties cars.

The pattern will also be thinner, no longer taking up the entire length of the doors.

The thinner pattern will save about $100 per car.

National Manager Procurement Stan Pope said the lightbars cost about the same as the current lights to install, but once on the vehicles the savings were considerable.

Initial tests, which have been carried out in windtunnels, indicate that there is an 8-10 per cent reduction on the drag on cars with LED lights.

Less drag means less fuel consumption and based on current estimates - in which 10.3 million litres of fuel is used by police each year - that could result in an annual saving of about $800,000.

While some of the new-look police cars have already been rolled out, Mr Pope said it would take six years for the process to be complete.

That was because it was too expensive to refit the current fleet, so the changes would only appear on new cars coming into the fleet.

Around 350 are expected to be introduced this year. By 2014 all marked police vehicles - from dog units to booze buses - should have the yellow and blue livery and LED lights.

Mr Pope said changes to the livery were based, in part, on studies that found stickers covering the entire doors were no more effective than partial markings, especially in busy and cluttered urban environments.

The single look would also make things easier operationally as the cars could be used for all duties, regardless of whether they were traffic or general duty vehicles.

Changes to the look of emergency service vehicles are also underway at the Fire Service.

Over the next year-and-a-half new-look fire engines are being rolled out across the country.

While many of the changes will only be noticeable to firefighters, the most obvious difference the public will see is the addition of the colour blue to red and fluorescent yellow appliances.

The blue appears to have no safety or security value but spokesman Scott Sargentina said it more accurately reflects the organisation's colours.

New Zealand Herald. "Arresting image update to save police force $800,000" nzherald.co.nz [updated Nov 11, 2008; cited Nov 12, 2008]. Available from
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10542312