Firearm Training

Much focus right now on race and policing...you may be wondering how police are trained.

That's why we sent abc 36's christy bollinger to show you a small part of it...a traing simulator jessamine county law enforcement get to use once a year.

L3: abc 36 news white police firearms training simulator jessamine county l3: abc 36 news white sgt.

Kevin grimes nicholasville police dept.

L3: abc 36 news white police firearms traing simulator jessamine county a disgruntled employee shooting up his workplace... gun fire a man running towards me with a knife..

"ahh these were some of the scenarios i had to respond to in the firearms traing simulator.... and boy, it was hard.

Christy"that was intense.

Sgt grimes"each officer in ou agency goes through this once a year in an effort to make them better officers."

The kentucky league of cities has three of these systems... law enforcement agencies like the nicholasville police department get a specific amount of time with the system to train all their officers... but departments aren;t required to do the trraing.

Grimes"it's about as close t realistic as you can get putting officers in hands on situations that are scenario based where they have to make decisions."

Officers will have to talk to the virtual suspects or victims..perform a traffic stop..

They might have to escort an elderly person with dementia back home... or try to talk down someone suicidal.

Instrcutor"our mouth is ou best tool that we have."

But some scenarios just require an officer to react with a gun drawn... like a shooting at a movie theater.

"it's the police get down.

Gunshot adrenaline is rushing... my heart was beating out my chest... at one point, i think i broke out in a sweat.

The scenarios were so realistic... and afterwards, the instructor would give critiques, grimes"the other thing we'v been able to do is offer it to people like you, offer it to the media, offer it to our citizens police academy, our politicians because we think it's important they get to experience a little of what officers go through everyday."

Sergeant kevin grimes says that's especially important to do right now when there's a lot of attention on police and use of force.

Grimes"it's easy for people t second guess what goes on out there i mean everybody does it."

How terrible i was at being a cop..

Showed me just how hard their jobs truly are... running towards danger is no task for the weak-hearted.

"oh my goodness, good god.

Christy bollinger, abc 36