HELENA — Tactical officers from all across Montana and the West were in Helena this week to learn valuable skills.
The annual Mountain States Tactical Officers Association conference brings SWAT officers from across Montana, Washington, Wyoming, Idaho, North and South Dakota—and this year Taiwan—together for a week of intensive training.
(WATCH: SWAT training event draws officers from across the west to Helena)
“The eagerness to learn, the want and desire to get better, the unwavering commitment to push themselves to failure so they can improve and get better is unlike anywhere I’ve seen in the country,” course instructor Tyler Verhaar said.
Verhaar leads a law enforcement casualty care course, which teaches medical skills for law enforcement.
“It’s a custom-tailored course specifically for law enforcement, to meet the environment and circumstances surrounding law enforcement and how they render aid and how they do medicine in high-threat, austere and challenging conditions,” Verhaar said.
Other courses focused on technology—like drones, which are becoming more widely used in SWAT operations—and duty weapon skills.
“We’re doing shooting, moving, malfunctions, wounded drills, some asymmetrical tactics that we would implement in a worst-case scenario,” Yellowstone County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Harrison Gillen said of the advanced carbine course he participated in.
Courses combined classroom learning and drills, then put skills to the test by applying stress and simulating realistic situations officers could encounter in the field.
“We learn the basics of hemorrhage control, airway management, all the things it takes to keep a person living,” Verhaar said. “We then take those skills they just developed and we immediately translate it into high-stress, hyper-realistic training environments and scenarios so that we can cement that learning into place and the officers will leave here feeling confident and empowered in their skillset to save human lives.”
This applies to the skills officers learned on the range, too.
“The biggest thing is real-world scenario stress, you’re trying to operate with actual bullets flying—it’s a lot different than standing on the range,” Lewis and Clark County Sheriff’s Office detective Jess Patrick said. “You fall to your level of training under stress, so the more reps you get, the better you are under stress.”
The week-long conference also encouraged interagency relationships and collaboration. In Montana, SWAT teams often work together, so establishing connections is key.
“It’s important to build networking, that way when you show up, you know, like Anaconda last year, we had agencies from all over the state there,” Patrick said.
More than 120 officers participated in this year’s training, and they’ll bring the skills they learned back to their home agencies across the West.
