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Editorial and photography: Jesse Wray-McCann
Police are alerted to a stolen car cruising through the crowded streets of suburban Bentleigh on a Wednesday afternoon.
Sergeant Mitch Hawley, the experienced officer leading the police units tracking the stolen Mercedes Benz SUV, carefully considers his options.
“We had the name of a potential suspect behind the wheel so we could have just followed him up later on, but the list of offences to this guy’s name meant we wanted to put a stop to it there and then,” Sgt Hawley said.
He has a number of units at his disposal — marked police cars if he wants an overt response and unmarked police cars if he wants to sneak up on the Mercedes.
Stop sticks thrown on to the road will burst the stolen car’s tyres, but every option comes with a different level of risk.
“If we got too close with any units we could have spooked him and if we threw the stop sticks out he could take off like a cut snake through a busy shopping strip with lots of people around,” Sgt Hawley said.
But there’s another game-changing weapon up Sgt Hawley’s sleeve.
He makes a call to Victoria Police’s Air Wing.
One of the Air Wing’s helicopters has just finished refuelling at its base at Essendon Fields Airport and its three-person crew — a pilot and two Tactical Flight Officers (TFOs), one as mission commander and one as systems operator — strides out on to the tarmac.
They fire up the chopper, head south-east and the mission commander TFO radios Sgt Hawley and his ground units to tell them the 25-kilometre trip across metropolitan Melbourne will take them just seven minutes.
The systems operator TFO controls one of the most powerful pieces of technology Victoria Police has at its disposal — an interlinked camera and mapping system.
While they’re still on their way, many kilometres from Bentleigh, the systems operator enters into the mapping system the address where the stolen car was last spotted.
The camera spins around, instantly locking on to the location and, within moments, the crew spots the stolen car and the people onboard.
Using the impressive mapping technology linked to the camera, the mission commander provides constant updates to the ground units.
With the chopper now relentlessly stalking the stolen car from the skies, Sgt Hawley can strategise as he watches the camera footage on his iPad.
“Having that aerial platform is key because we’ve got all the time in the world to move our units into the best positions and turn an unplanned situation into a carefully-planned response,” he said.
It’s not long before officers spike the car’s tyres with a stop stick, forcing the suspects on board to soon ditch it and flee on foot.
But with the helicopter watching from above and the ground units all strategically positioned, police quickly have five in custody.
Car chases like this form a large part of the work the Air Wing does across Victoria, with its aeroplane, three helicopters and dozens of drones also doing search and rescue jobs, crime prevention and detection, and rapid deployment of specialist units.
TFO Sergeant Jim Stafford and Chief Pilot Rob Rogel have both been at the Air Wing for more than 20 years and have experienced the full gamut of jobs, sometimes within the span of a single shift.
Sgt Stafford said the tight-knit nature of everyone working at the unit is not by chance, but by design.
“It’s a crew environment where we must have deep trust in the skills and experience of one another, and it’s something we work hard to maintain,” Sgt Stafford said.
“We’ve all got one another’s lives in our hands, especially when we’re doing something like a winch rescue job.”
The different roles of each of the crew members all harmoniously come together as different parts of one body.
The pilot acts as the feet to move them around, the mission commander TFO acts as the voice and ears, and the systems operator acts as the eyes.
Chief Pilot Rogel said seamless coordination both within the aircraft crew and with other police was essential.
“Teamwork between the helicopter and members on the ground, especially during car pursuits, is something we are really getting down to a fine art now,” he said.
“When the helicopter is in the air for one of those jobs, it’s pretty hard for anyone to get away, and it’s really satisfying to play a part in that.”
But by far the best part of the job for Air Wing members are those moments when they find someone during a search for a missing person.
“They’re the jobs that give us the highest satisfaction, not the gung ho jobs, because when you find and rescue someone, it can be a life-changing event for them, their family and even the community,” Chief Pilot Rogel said.
Former Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Mick Miller often described a policing career as having a ticket to the greatest show on Earth.
The Air Wing arguably has the best seat in the house.
