RCMP Traffic helicopter tickets 35 violations in four hours
Posted Aug 24, 2013 10:23 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Using a helicopter, the Airdrie Integrated Traffic Unit stopped 28 vehicles and issued 35 tickets during an aircraft-based traffic enforcement session Friday.
The four hour traffic blitz focused on the Queen Elizabeth II Highway, just north of Airdrie.
According to Sheriff Jason Graw, a trained officer watches northbound and southbound traffic from the air.
He says using aircraft as an enforcement tool allows police to monitor traffic in ways that they cannot otherwise do
Graw says, “we know that speed is a factor in approximately 25 percent of fatal and serious injury collisions in the province.”
“We know that if we can bring speeds down we can also reduce the number of serious and fatal collisions.”
Graw says air traffic can also aid police in spotting people under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
Airdrie RCMP have no specific plans to take to the sky again, but hope to get out a few more times before the end of the year.
Graw adds Albertans should expect the helicopter to be used in speed enforcement zones throughout the province, not only in the Calgary and Airdrie region.
