Page 10 - topcoverissue19

10 TOP COVER SPRING 2024

A FIREARMS FACILITY SECOND TO NONE

Tony Long shares his recent visit to Northumbria Police’s state impressive firearms training facility

Early February and with the weather
forecast threatening snow, I took a
throw of the dice and headed north
to visit an old mate, Sgt Mick Vent,
Northumbria’s CFI.
We were due a pint and a curry after
being unable to attend his stag do (a
narrow escape probably), and after a
recent visit to Shield Sights in Dorset I
was keen to see for myself how ‘Venty’
and his team, as the first UK force to
equip every one of their AFO’s with a
red-dot equipped pistol, had managed
it, and what lessons they had learnt
from the experience.

Superb facility
It was my first visit to their
facility since before lockdown, but five-day initial course in 1982 and
as always I was treated to superb wished them all luck for their futures.
Geordie hospitality and given a tour As a former Sergeant with the
of the site while we discussed latest Royal Marines Reserve, Venty’s
developments. I became aware, for the connections with the Corps have
first time, that the site was also the
resulted in another valuable revenue
operational base for Northumbria’s
stream for the force. The Royal
ARVs, meaning no wasted hours
Marines have made regular use of
travelling to training and more time
Northumbria’s facility for several years
on the ranges or undertaking tactical
as part of their ‘beat-up’ training for
training in their superb facility,
urban combat, and this consequently
something I suspect most UK forces
resulted in both the US Marine Corps
can only dream of.
and the Royal Dutch Marines coming
Northumbria are contracted to
over to use the site, as well British
provide four initial five-week firearms
courses a year for the Met and while Army battalions training for Op
I was on site I was able to chat with Templar and other agencies.
officers in their final week of training At the end of 2018 Northumbria
and hoping to join the Met’s Palaces decided to look at ways of improving
and Diplomatic Protection Division. pistol accuracy and started a properly
I bored them with details of my own funded project. Part of that process

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