New Equipment For Armed Response Vehicles

Posted on April 11, 2012

A simple but effective idea should save time and money when it's rolled out across the collaborated Armed Policing Unit in Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire.

As well as two or three firearms officers, each Armed Response Vehicle (ARV) currently has to carry a mobile armoury in the cabin which houses the firearms when not in use; and a vast array of equipment in the boot of the car.

Using his experience as a firearms officer and position as the unit's Head of Collaborative Fleet,
Sgt Matt Stein of the Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Firearms Support Unit has worked with Thames Valley Police, Volvo and an engineering company, Safeguard, to design and produce a new purpose built load carrier for the ARV's.

The load carrier system will have modular storage for all the equipment firearms officers carry and an integral safe for the weapons - all stowed in the boot.

As well as Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire, Thames Valley Police and Cambridgeshire Constabulary will also use the new carriers.

Not only is the new design easier to use, it is Volvo approved and fully compliant with health and safety by having the mobile armoury more securely stored in the boot. The modular design can be dismantled and re-built into any vehicles likely to be used by the Armed Policing Unit – saving each of the four participating forces £30,000 over the next ten years.   

The load carrier system will start appearing very soon as it gets built into the high performance diesel Volvo V70 D5's, which will be gradually coming on line to serve as ARV's across Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Thames Valley. These forces are part of the Chiltern Transport Consortium who also assisted in the design process.

Although Cambridgeshire are currently using Volvos, the other forces have a variety of petrol vehicles in use as ARVs and the change to diesel is coming to Beds, Herts and TVP to cut both fuel costs and carbon footprint.

Source: Ringmaster Bedfordshire