Tulsa Police Take Training Sky High

Dan Bewley, News On 6

TULSA, Oklahoma -- It was quite the scene downtown Wednesday as the Tulsa Police Department's Special Operations Team trained on how to secure high-rise buildings.

They used the parking garage near the old City Hall as training ground in hopes if the real thing is needed they'll be ready.

"We have to train for what we call an eventuality," said Tulsa Police Sergeant Mike Parsons. "We train for so many different things we don't know exactly what is going to happen and when it's going to happen and so we try and say it's not if, it's when."

Wednesday's mission has each helicopter loaded with four team members or operators.

"We bring the operators in and we insert them on to the structure, we have them get out through a process that we've trained all morning, cover the helicopter so that if there were any hostile threats to the helicopter that they would be able to defend the helicopter pilots as they out and then allow the operators to do their business," said Tulsa Police Captain Ryan Perkins.

Tulsa Police said it's important to train over and over and then train some more. The goal is to make the landing and unloading become second nature so that when an emergency strikes these men and women are ready and lives are saved.

"We want the insertion to be the part that the operators don't worry about, to be the easy part, and the things that they have to be after that to be things they have to worry about," Captain Perkins said.