PW_3_2019

Professional Development

Simon’s Story C hris and I flew out a day before the event , gaining an extra night at the fantastic Unda Campsite. Driving to the campsite over the beautiful Uddevalla Bridge was fantastic. Our Swedish Log Cabin overlooked the Skagerrak Strait, which flows between Norway, Sweden and the Jutland peninsula of Denmark. Each cabin housed four IPA members, giving us a chance to make new friends. Chris and I shared with Danny, who works for the German Federal Police at Munich Airport and Sergei, who works in Barcelona for the Catalonia Police. The following day we all wore our respective uniforms for the opening ceremony, and made quite an impression on the residents of Uddevalla, when we descended on the town square for a group photograph. Back at Uddevalla Police Station, we received a welcome from Swedish IPA President; May-Britt V. R. Ronnebro. Then, we met our instructors: Slavo Gozdzik, Ulf Pettersson & Per Nyberg from IPA DTG Sweden, and Rob Stenhouse & Richard Dean from IPA DTG UK, who told us what they had in store for us over the next few days. We returned to a lovely meal at the campsite which allowed the group to get to know each other a little bit better over a few Swedish beers. It was fantastic getting to know people from so many countries, and reassuring to hear that we all face similar challenges.

With Sweden being an hour ahead, the 06:30 start felt earlier than it should have. We had a lovely breakfast on site before splitting into four teams; Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta. I was in Bravo team, along with Matt McInally and Kiran Gharial, both from London IPA. It was an intensive day of training; the explosive self defence system was an eye opener, especially for me, as Slavo used me to demonstrate an open handed strike to the thigh. Most of the training was delivered outdoors in the beautiful Swedish countryside to maximise the realism. All of the instructors were exceptional in their knowledge and attitude. We trained in our operational uniform, again to maximise the realism of the training. On Saturday, Rob demonstrated some excellent spontaneous knife defences, which really changed my thinking on how to deal with a knife incident. Saturday evening was our gala dinner, it was held just outside Uddevalla at the Bjursjostugan ski facility. We had a lovely, traditional Swedish meal and dressed for the occasion. We had a fantastic night which was brought to a close with a speech from Swedish IPA President May-Britt V. R. Ronnebro and presentation of our certificates. I had a fantastic time at COPS, learned lots of new skills and made some fantastic new friends. I am very grateful to the Section UK for the opportunity to attend, and I encourage anyone thinking of attending COPS in the future to do so; I know I certainly will be.

POLICE WORLD Vol 64 No.3, 2019

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