Riverton, Jackson bicycle officers sharpened their street skills with four days of training
by Ernie Over on June 6, 2013
(Riverton, Wyo.) – For the past four days, the parking lot at Mote Hall at Central Wyoming College has been closed to vehicles as five police officers from two jurisdictions have been training on bicycles. The parking lot was filled with orange cones provided by the Lander Police Department’s traffic control division, although staff shortages prevented any LPD officers from participating this time.
Instead, three Riverton officers and two from Jackson spent the last four days in a combination of classroom training and on-ths-street training. Riverton residents may have noticed the five officers and two trainers peddling around town.
The agility needed for a bicycle officer to respond to pedestrians, motorized traffic and other hazards on streets and alleys was pushed to the limit by trainer Rance Okada, a retired Westminster, Colo., police colonel and Carey Jacobsen, an instructor from the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office in Cheyenne. Participating officers include Garrett Kellam and Kyle Cannon from the Jackson Police Department and Riverton officers Sgt. Scott Komers, Ron Cunningham and Peter McCall.
On Tuesday, the training included the Riverton Fire Department as the riders were hosed down in a high speed braking drill. The riders would approach the “wet” zone at a speed of 15 to 20 mph, and then screech to a halt in about 10 feet on water covered pavement while their feet and tires were sprayed with water by the RFD’s David Woolery. Other drills included officers zig zagging between cones, hitting a solid object in “bump-n-go” drills, cycling in circles around cones, getting four officers on bikes in a small box where each bicycle overlapped with the others in a turning and control exercise, plus the road and stairs work.
The training was offered by the Rural Justice Training Center at Central Wyoming College.
“We’re going to reinstitute the bicycle patrols this summer and our guys needed to get back up to speed,” said Riverton Police Captain C. T. Smith, who was on hand to observe most of the drills. “It’s not just jumping on a bicycle and riding around, there’s quite a bit of situational training needed.”