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Homestead first Reserve unit to conduct TASER training

  • Published
  • By Ian Carrier
  • 482nd Fighter Wing Public Affairs
HOMESTEAD AIR RESERVE BASE, Fla. --  The 482nd Security Forces Squadron recently became the first unit in the Air Force Reserve Command to complete training with TASER guns, adding a new non lethal option to their arsenal.

Security forces must undergo extensive training to be qualified to carry a TASER. Training includes hours of classroom instruction, TASER familiarization, voluntary exposure and scenario-based training. The scenarios not only instruct on how to use the TASER, but help users hone their judgment on when it is appropriate to use or in some cases not use.

The training was conducted by members of the Miami Beach Police Department.

482nd Security Forces Squadron Police Services Chief, Lt. Juan Lemus, was one of the trainees who took part in the voluntary exposure. Electrodes from a TASER were attached to the volunteers' back, and for five seconds they felt what it was like to be on the receiving end.

"It's like nothing you have ever felt before, they call it riding the lightning, and it is well named," said Lt. Lemus. "One minute your fine and then they said "TASER, TASER, TASER" and then it hits you and your muscles lock up... just contract and you don't see anything else, your mind is totally on the pain going through your entire body. Then, after the longest five minutes of your life it ends, and you're alive. The officers who gave us the training said it would feel like we had gone to the gym and worked out intensely for an hour.  I can understand now why a person going through this once is more than enough in one lifetime."

The TASER gun fires probes that can stun a person for a period of up to five seconds, allowing security forces personnel time to seize control of a potentially violent situation.

Upon impact with the target, 50,000 electrical volts run through thin copper wires resembling fishing line, with prongs on the end of the line that attach to the perpetrator and deliver the voltage, temporarily disabling them. The prongs are to be released only by medical personnel, when they arrive on the scene.
 
Multiple safety and accountability mechanisms are used with the TASER.  Each time a TASER is fired, "confetti" containing a serial number corresponding to the cartridge is expelled and allows tracking back to the TASER unit and the individual to which the unit is assigned. Each TASER also has a computer tracking capability, which captures the time and duration of discharge from each system.

The TASER was invented by NASA researcher Jack Cover and is marketed by TASER International. The trademark is an acronym for Thomas A. Swift's Electric Rifle; homage to Cover's childhood hero Tom Swift and references the 1911 novel Tom Swift and His Electric Rifle. Such products can be described as "electronic control devices," or ECDs.

TASER guns have been in use worldwide by Air Force security forces personnel since 2002.