SPOKANE, Wash. — If you were wondering what a helicopter was doing flying around last week, the Spokane County Sheriff's Office has an answer.
It was actually the Spokane County Sheriff's K9 unit doing training with some new equipment on the Rescue 3 helicopter.
A video shared by the sheriff's office shows the crew chief's view of the training as he hangs outside the helicopter.
The sheriff's office trains its K9's regularly with the helicopters. Corporal Mark Gregory said this helps the dogs get used to being around them.
But last week, the K9's and their handlers trained with the newly acquired K9 harnesses. The exercise included hoisting and lowering the K9's with their handlers.
"Now that we have this hoisting capability, we wanted them to also be able to understand what that was and be familiar with that," Gregory said. "So when we do possibly need to deploy them into a rugged area or somewhere farther way, they'll be able to still concentrate on doing what they need to do."
Gregory said the hoisting capability is relatively new on Rescue 3. It's meant to allow firefighters and medics quicker access to someone who may be injured or needing help in rugged terrain.
After last week's training, now the K9 unit will be able respond as well.
"Because never know what's going to occur, this was one of those things that we're now able to deploy those dogs with their handlers and go to an area that maybe would have taken us an hour or two to get to."
Overall, Gregory said the training was a success, and we can expect to see these flying dogs and their handlers in the future.
"From my understanding they seemed to have a pretty good time," Gregory said. "None of them seemed overly concerned about it."