Up in the air: Inside the CPS Air Support Unit and the HAWCS helicopter

“What’s that black smoke over there?”

That was the question CPS pilot Cam Buschert asked his partner as they got in the air on Saturday and moments later, they were on top of the massive fire that had engulfed a Victoria Park construction site.

After takeoff, Buschert and his partner Cst. Darcy Christensen quickly went from their hangar in the northeast to the massive blaze at 17th Avenue and Centre St.

There were no injuries reported in the fire and the pair deserve some credit.

During an initial approach, Christensen noted unique black smoke coming not from the fire itself and thought he saw part of the building just next to it burning up as well. At the time, the fire crews on the ground had their water cannons solely on the main fire and because of the position of their trucks, couldn’t see the second building burning. The chopper gave ground units the new info and fire crews were able to get water on the building before serious damage was done.

While Christensen says it was a quick team effort, Buschert is a bit more forthright saying his partner is being quite modest.

“He basically saved that building,” Buschert said.

It’s just one example of the work the Air Support Unit does patrolling from above, as Calgary was the first Canadian city to have a municipal police force with the operation.

The unit is celebrating 20 years this summer and for the 17-year veteran Christensen, his last five in the chopper stand out.

“I’ve been a part of several different great units, I can tell you this is the best unit that I’ve been a part of and I believe it’s the best unit in our service,” he said. “Because we get to be involved in the bigger calls, we get to see some crazy stuff and memorable stuff, it’s unreal and I’m pretty lucky.”

Despite the enthusiasm, the origin of the unit was anything but positive: back in 1993, Cst. Rick Sonnenberg was tragically killed while trying to deploy a spike belt, after getting struck by a stolen vehicle. There was a push for a police helicopter, spearheaded by his family, and in July 1995, the first chopper went on patrol.

A lot has changed since it was simply a night shift operation. It now goes 24/7 with four tactical officers, four pilots, a chief pilot and two on-staff aircraft maintenance engineers with an annual budget of around $2-million.

Sgt. Michelle Cave has been in the force for 25 years and has spent the last seven with the unit. She says it take a lot to get any of those spots.

“It’s a competition to get in here, on either side,” she said.

Would-be tactical officers are tested on spatial awareness and communication skills through ground tests and flights, with successful ones going through 10 weeks of training to sit in the air. Cave said when it comes to selecting pilots, they can come from the industry or the military and they need a fair bit of hours.

“We have a minimum of 2,500 flying hours as a requirement for them just to come in through the door, 300 of those hours have to be flying at night because we do so many operations at night,” she said.

The view at night can’t be beat, whether it’s flying over the Calgary Tower and the Bow Building or going past Canada Olympic Park.

Buschert has been flying for 16 years, from forest fires to general utility helicopter work and has been with the force for a year and a half.

The former commercial pilot wanted the spot both to stay close to home, as well as having an interest in law enforcement.

“This is a way to be a civilian, but still involved in it and still pursue my passion of flying helicopters,” he said, adding the competitive and close-knit unit creates a unique bond.

“The camaraderie between the police officers and the ground units that support us is huge, it’s a well-organized unit, everybody’s friends here and it’s a lot of fun to come to work,” he said.

Like the size and scope of the unit, the technology has changed as well. As Buschert takes off from the unit’s lot in the northeast to hovering over the skyline in mere moments, Christensen uses infrared technology to see every nook of the downtown with stunning clarity, zooming in a regular pedestrian walking down the street or a vehicle driving along Macleod Trail.

He does so while listening to calls from the ground and if he hears of something noteworthy, he needs to only punch in the coordinates and his camera goes to that location immediately, even if it’s far away.

He can track a car’s speed going down the highway or use a sun-spotlight to illuminate someone in a large field, but he doesn’t just rely on technology. During a routine patrol Sunday night, he notices a barely noticeable flicker in the southeast and 10 seconds later, spots the source. It turns out to be a simple spotlight from pedestrians in a park, but it demonstrates how HAWCS can be the first to notice a crime happening, sometimes even before it occurs.

The combination of vantage point, expertise and technology results in an 82 per cent success rate of being first on scene when dispatched to a call.

In 2014, HAWCS flew for 2,700 hours and headed to over 4,200 calls for service and Cave explains how the unit is solely responsible for an operation.

“Meaning that without the helicopter being there, the ability to make the apprehension or the arrest in a timely fashion – which means right now – probably wouldn’t have occurred, in 441 situations, so we were responsible for 441 arrests of people last year,” she said. Of those arrests, 753 charges were laid.

The unit was also involved in 50 stolen vehicle cases where culprits were mobile or attempted to flee from police.

“That is really one of the things that we’re so successful at and one of the reasons that there was such a big push in the early 90s, because it’s much safer to follow something that’s fleeing, a vehicle or even a person from the sky, than on the ground,” she said. “Getting in behind a vehicle and putting your overhead lights on and chasing it through the city just doesn’t happen anymore because it’s too dangerous.”

Fortunately on a Sunday, there’s no such danger to intervene on or pursuits to make. It’s smooth sailing for the officers who work four 11-hour shifts per week: two at day and night each. That’s followed by four days off and then it’s back in the sky.

But if something does happen, it doesn’t take long to arrive at a destination. Christensen and Buschert recently timed how long it took them to get from the endpoint of the northwest to the South Health Campus in the southeast and the duration was around eight minutes.

They hover back to Victoria Park where the fire occurred and Christensen flashes back to the 2013 floods. He was in the air when water took over the Stampede Grounds, getting a call about a man getting swept away by the waters and was able to spot him.

“He actually was hanging on to a tree, so we were able to find him, direct the fire department to him and they were able to get him to the ground safely,” he said.

It’s another example of the versatility of the unit, whether it’s pursuing a stolen vehicle, directing fire crews or spotting an assault in the downtown. Cave said whether you spot them at noon or 3 a.m. right over your head, you don’t have to panic.

“They are in the safest community in Calgary at that time, because there will be nobody that can see what’s going on in their neighbourhood like the guys that are in that helicopter,” she said.