#$^%^#*$&%^*%(&%
Went in for Taser training today.
For those with high speed connections, look at the above videos. They do some justice to the experience. But there is nothing compared to living it. My favorite videos are the Phoenix PD and Drunk Domestic Assault videos.
Okay, a few facts that they covered.
So two people volunteer to hold me up and lay me gently down so I don't break my face. I lift my shirt, they hook me up. I was remembering what another officer said, he just thought of movie characters being tortured and not screaming and he did the same, so I figure I could do the same. Talk about being wrong.
So they hook me up. I tense up a little bit and squeam, waiting for the hit and I hear the certifying officer yell "ut-oh!" Not a good thing to hear when you are hooked up to vehicle jumpers and are about to receive 50,000 volts.
Ah, just a battery problems. Laughs were had by all but yours truly. I was wondering at this point why I am still voluntarily hooked up to a handheld bug zapper and not in a mental health ward.
An "Okay, all clear, ready?" comes out. I sigh, say yes, and the FESTIVITIES begin.
So, here I am. It starts pulsing through my body, I feel muscles lock up. I can wiggle my feet but that is about it. I start mentally counting down the five seconds and make an attempt at avoiding a scream(s).
One-One-Thousand Two-One....HOLY COW THAT $^!# HURTS ""ARGHGHHG-AIEE!!!"
I think I got one, maybe 2 seconds without screaming. It seemed to either take that long for my brain to register the pain or the build up of electricity surging through. After about five seconds I was wondering why the thing wasn't shutting off. For surely I can not scream on one breath with full force for any longer than three seconds. Something is wrong. The Taser is not shutting off. Why won't my police buddy Kurt put me out of my misery? Why couldn't I have been shot by a real gun instead? Do I REALLY want to carry one of these? WHY THE HELL IS IT NOT SHUTTING OFF?! I could shoot myself. Oh jeeze I think my heart is gonna explode! I think my kidneys are gonna implode. Why do I ache all over? WHEN THE $&#^# IS IT GONNA TURN OFF?! Why did you volunteer for this, Rhett? This is what you get for being an idiot. WHY THE *#$&;;%^ WILL THE #&$^#^ THING NOT TURN OFF!!
I slump down, lay there for a bit, drop a bad word. (As most of my friends know, I rarely if ever cuss. I think 2/3 of the people there have never seen it.) Everyone laughs. It is on video. Fun is had by all....but for I.
It is kinda hard to describe it. If you have ever touched an electric fence you have a very very painful burning/metallic sensory perception where you made contact, and anywhere from a tingling to a light pain on the area immediately surrounding it. With this you feel the worse pain throughout your entire neck to groin region. And the arms and legs feel the lesser effects. But you feel all the pain inside out. It disrupts your neural network and tells your muscles to relax and contract at 20 times a second. Half way through the process your kidneys and the inside of your chest, possibly your heart, start throbbing. The best way to destribe is an alien jumping-out-of-chest feeling. When it is over you have a partial adrenal rush but at the same time all of your muscles are sore from the work they had. It would be fascinating if it wasn't so painful.
And to describe - IT IS THE MOST PAINFUL SENSATION YOU CAN EVER POSSIBLY EXPERIENCE.
After that, a bit more class, a break, and we bring out tasers and a metallic target we all shoot at. This is where I get to see the probes up close and am very glad I did not get shot with them.
The effects are a bit lingering. The pain shuts off almost immediately. You feel very tired, yet pumped. Workout is one description, but it seems a bit different. My chest still feels sore/numb. I went out and ran on the driveway for a bit several hours afterward and still have a funny sensation. I am sure it is not a heart-attack and just strained muscles. Where one of the patches was on my back it kinda itched throughout the day. It could all very well be mental.
I am so glad that I never have to do that again.
*Edit: I added the asterisk bit to add more information. I do not know when the training was revised but it was within the last training cycle. Whic is around half a year to a year old. So the number of 3 autopsies is to the best of my knowledge very up-to-date We have all seen a lot of reports in the media about Tasers causing death and even though I am still more neutral in this field than fully supporting the Taser company. I still want to point to the fact that the media always wants to sensationalise any news and even no-news stories for the benefit of controversy and selling ads.
For those with high speed connections, look at the above videos. They do some justice to the experience. But there is nothing compared to living it. My favorite videos are the Phoenix PD and Drunk Domestic Assault videos.
Okay, a few facts that they covered.
- Taser have never been ruled to be a cause of death in any instance.
- During research on animal and human subjects the Taser device in no way, shape, or form interfered with the heart. (Other than make it beat faster due to the adrenal rush.)
- In three autopsies the Taser was listed as a contributing factor. Which means other sources of problems were involved. These 3 findings are all that is out there over the past ten years and are currently being refuted by independent scientist.*
- Tasers do not interfere with pace makers.
- Animals and humans were likely harmed during testing.
Anyway. They have a bit of class training covering some fundamentals. Then they set out some mats and me being the only rookie and non-charged officer I got to go and get zapped. They ask if I was ready and I replied honestly, no. But went up like a good loyal worker. (Who works for no pay I might add!)
Now. They used to use something called a gator clamp. Think really small jumper cables. Well they caused problems. They do not make good contact and the electricity arcs through and causes lasting pain/3rd degree burns. So I opted to be shot with the probes. Which are long metal cylinders with a huge barb at the end. After I saw one of these missiles of doom I decided that that course of action was not the best thing to go through. Luckily a new solution was devised over a few weeks prior and through some experimentation they found recently that if they hook up EKG pads and then the gator clamps no flesh will turn into crispy barbecue.So two people volunteer to hold me up and lay me gently down so I don't break my face. I lift my shirt, they hook me up. I was remembering what another officer said, he just thought of movie characters being tortured and not screaming and he did the same, so I figure I could do the same. Talk about being wrong.
So they hook me up. I tense up a little bit and squeam, waiting for the hit and I hear the certifying officer yell "ut-oh!" Not a good thing to hear when you are hooked up to vehicle jumpers and are about to receive 50,000 volts.
Ah, just a battery problems. Laughs were had by all but yours truly. I was wondering at this point why I am still voluntarily hooked up to a handheld bug zapper and not in a mental health ward.
An "Okay, all clear, ready?" comes out. I sigh, say yes, and the FESTIVITIES begin.
So, here I am. It starts pulsing through my body, I feel muscles lock up. I can wiggle my feet but that is about it. I start mentally counting down the five seconds and make an attempt at avoiding a scream(s).
One-One-Thousand Two-One....HOLY COW THAT $^!# HURTS ""ARGHGHHG-AIEE!!!"
I think I got one, maybe 2 seconds without screaming. It seemed to either take that long for my brain to register the pain or the build up of electricity surging through. After about five seconds I was wondering why the thing wasn't shutting off. For surely I can not scream on one breath with full force for any longer than three seconds. Something is wrong. The Taser is not shutting off. Why won't my police buddy Kurt put me out of my misery? Why couldn't I have been shot by a real gun instead? Do I REALLY want to carry one of these? WHY THE HELL IS IT NOT SHUTTING OFF?! I could shoot myself. Oh jeeze I think my heart is gonna explode! I think my kidneys are gonna implode. Why do I ache all over? WHEN THE $&#^# IS IT GONNA TURN OFF?! Why did you volunteer for this, Rhett? This is what you get for being an idiot. WHY THE *#$&;;%^ WILL THE #&$^#^ THING NOT TURN OFF!!
I slump down, lay there for a bit, drop a bad word. (As most of my friends know, I rarely if ever cuss. I think 2/3 of the people there have never seen it.) Everyone laughs. It is on video. Fun is had by all....but for I.
It is kinda hard to describe it. If you have ever touched an electric fence you have a very very painful burning/metallic sensory perception where you made contact, and anywhere from a tingling to a light pain on the area immediately surrounding it. With this you feel the worse pain throughout your entire neck to groin region. And the arms and legs feel the lesser effects. But you feel all the pain inside out. It disrupts your neural network and tells your muscles to relax and contract at 20 times a second. Half way through the process your kidneys and the inside of your chest, possibly your heart, start throbbing. The best way to destribe is an alien jumping-out-of-chest feeling. When it is over you have a partial adrenal rush but at the same time all of your muscles are sore from the work they had. It would be fascinating if it wasn't so painful.
And to describe - IT IS THE MOST PAINFUL SENSATION YOU CAN EVER POSSIBLY EXPERIENCE.
After that, a bit more class, a break, and we bring out tasers and a metallic target we all shoot at. This is where I get to see the probes up close and am very glad I did not get shot with them.
The effects are a bit lingering. The pain shuts off almost immediately. You feel very tired, yet pumped. Workout is one description, but it seems a bit different. My chest still feels sore/numb. I went out and ran on the driveway for a bit several hours afterward and still have a funny sensation. I am sure it is not a heart-attack and just strained muscles. Where one of the patches was on my back it kinda itched throughout the day. It could all very well be mental.
I am so glad that I never have to do that again.
*Edit: I added the asterisk bit to add more information. I do not know when the training was revised but it was within the last training cycle. Whic is around half a year to a year old. So the number of 3 autopsies is to the best of my knowledge very up-to-date We have all seen a lot of reports in the media about Tasers causing death and even though I am still more neutral in this field than fully supporting the Taser company. I still want to point to the fact that the media always wants to sensationalise any news and even no-news stories for the benefit of controversy and selling ads.
2 Comments:
Man, I'm sure glad I never had to go through that to get certified. You don't have to get shot to get certified to carry a gun. Dude, I feel for you! I suppose what you call probes, we call darts. The probes are the cartridges that plug into the holes where the darts go and have extension tips like collapsable radio antennas that you reach out and touch someone with. FIVE SECONDS?? Damn, I would be about ready to want to kill someone at that point!
I'm sorry, better you than me! :-)
The darts is the better description, but here they call them probes or prongs. And they are huge!
Taser does not require you to be shot but local policy does. I think it is to show the officer the effect and to show the public that we trust their safety enough that we are willing to get shot in mass. It is almost state wide that everyone gets shot with them.
I talked to my LT who certified me yesterday. I forgot to hand in my waiver of liability paper and went in. I blame 50,000 volts for forgetting to turn the paper in. I asked him and he told me that I actually lasted about three seconds before I started screaming. Which amazed me because the last two seconds felt like ten.
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