NEW CUMBERLAND, Pa. –
The Defense Logistics Agency Installation Management at Susquehanna Police Department hosted a training event with the Dauphin County Crisis Response Team and the Mobile Field Force Unit on the Defense Distribution Center Susquehanna installation Sept. 28.
The training focused on crowd control tactics and techniques.
DLA Police Lt. Richard Michener observed the event that provided necessary training for both Dauphin County units. Michener said this event was the first he’s seen with the CRT integrating with MFFU.
Per a memorandum of understanding, DLA Police train with their Dauphin County counterparts quarterly.
“One of the requirements of the MOU is that we understand their capabilities, and up until this point we didn’t know that they had an integrated role with the Mobile Field Force Unit as far as riot control. While we’ve not had a riot or demonstration of any kind on the installation, we still need to know what their capabilities are. We integrate and train with them often, but there are times that we are learning and understanding while observing their training techniques here – these are the two main requirements of the MOU,” Michener said.
“For today’s scenario, the CRT and MFFU get called out to respond to a specific type of incident, those in the green uniform conduct crowd control and those in blue are assisting. The training today combined those two skills to see who does what and how in this type of situation,” said Michener, adding, “In the crowd control situation there will be an arrest team that falls in behind the line and they’ll move through the line, arresting certain subjects and bring them back to behind the line, or they’ll do a downed officer rescue in the front and bring them to the back.”
Depending on the type of exercise planned for the installation, DLA Police will often integrate and train together with these agencies.
“Typically, we do integrate with them, or set up a specialized class. We’ve done an armed vehicle defense class with one of their sniper team leaders back in May, and we’ll do another one this month (October). So, we try to pick somebody that has a specialty, like door breaching, and some of our guys will work directly with them in a training scenario.”
The DLA Police provide around-the-clock force protection, antiterrorism and security operations through police services, facilities security, emergency response and protective countermeasure programs for Agency installations and facilities to protect DLA people, resources, mission and infrastructure from violence and destruction.