Many of the exhibitors at the 2022 SHOT Show are on a mission to help law enforcement, but some companies do that in a really big way. While walking later in the week, I had gained a firm understanding that you cannot see everything. However, the exhibit from Ring Power Tactical Solutions was hard to miss.
In a prime location at the end of an aisle near the food court for all to see, Ring Power Tactical Solutions proudly displayed The Rook, which has been around for more than a decade. It is a tracked armored critical incident vehicle that an agency or department can outfit with a hydraulic breaching ram, a grapple claw, a vehicle extraction tool, and an armored deployment platform (ADP) – which has recently been enhanced to give tactical teams an even higher point of entry when needed.
“Originally it was designed to do second-story entries. That fully extended 11 feet to the bottom of the platform,” Ring Power’s Justin Rutherford explained Thursday afternoon at SHOT. “We came out with a new design with a ladder system for a third story entry so you have about 18 feet of access.”
He also pointed out that the latest version of the ADP still has the same armor as the earlier model and provides protection up to .30-06 armor piercing rounds. Both the ADP and The Rook have NIJ Level IV shielding.
While The Rook and ADP are large and imposing, elsewhere a well-known brand has taken a step in a smaller direction.
EOTech is launching its new EFLX Mini Reflex Sight (MRS) and several were mounted on handguns on display surrounded by a steady crowd jockeying for a chance to check them out. The heavy-duty aluminum housing is tough and expected to live up to the EOTech durability reputation. It is available with a 3 MOA or a 6 MOA dot. On the flip side of the same display, EOTech featured the new Vudu 1-20x28 FFP. This scope is made with 34mm one-piece aircraft aluminum and featuring a single-piece eyepiece, a removable throw lever, a low-profile elevation turret with push/pull locking system, and a capped windage turret.
Directly across from EOTech, I navigated the crowd to check a popular platform for law enforcement. In the Daniel Defense booth, a 16-inch barrel .308 Delta 5 Pro rifle sat atop a lightweight tripod totally decked out and suppressed. The Delta V launched several years ago, but the Chassis System began production in 2021. The popular bolt gun comes in a polymer stock option, but the Chassis System option has proven more popular with law enforcement and precision shooters. The Delta 5 Pro is guaranteed to shoot .5 MOA or less at 100 yards.
Over at the FoxFury booth I checked out some of their scene, shield, and drone lighting but also learned a little about the Tacswan Tactical Electronic Distraction Device (TEDD). It can distract with 120 DB sound and 2,600 lumens with eight programable light and sound modes and is self righting when overturned. The TEDD is IPX7 rated, rechargeable, and reusable.
Closer over to our POLICE Magazine/PoliceMag.com booth, I popped in to visit Core Survival Inc. several times and was briefed on their Hel-Star 6 Gen III helmet light. Although their lights have been around for a while, this represents the latest version. The LE Tactical version of the light is programable for green flashing, red flashing, NIR infared flash/dim, and NIR infared steady to offer several options a team can use to indicate friend or possibly even mark an injured member with the red flashing function. In dim environments, the Hel-Star 6 Gen III can excel in providing clear visual indicators.
I also learned about the value of a weapon-mounted camera from Brian Heeden, president and CEO of Viridian Tactical. With a body-mounted camera system, the field of view is often blocked by the officer’s arms when they punch out into a firing position. Or, maybe the chest camera is blocked by a door frame, part of a vehicle, or other object. When there is an officer-involved shooting, a camera/light combo on the rail captures unobstructed, well-illuminated footage. The data is then stored in the removable battery pack. When the sidearm is drawn, the camera is activated automatically. Viridian says its cameras have already provided crucial, factual information in two shootings by officers in which the body-mounted cameras did not capture the event.
