The largest municipal air law enforcement operation in the world is the Air Support Division (ASD) of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD).
The fleet consists of 14 Eurocopter AS350B2 helicopters and five Bell Jet Ranger B3 helicopters, as well as one King Air fixed-wing aircraft. Their mission is to provide citywide air support to patrol units as they work to reduce crime and improve officer and public safety – and without reliable communications, this would become a difficult task.
Enter Cobham, who will be supplying their Flexcomm™ RT-7000 Panel Mount Tactical Radio to the LAPD. The new RT-7000 Panel Mount Tactical Radio embodies an evolutionary Software Defined Radio (SDR) design with a modular architecture that can be configured and upgraded as operator requirements and mission evolve.
Cobham’s Flexcomm™ RT-7000 Tactical Radio.
The aircraft will stay current and ready for action with AM/FM VHF/UHF and P25 today and TETRA, LTE, SATCOM, HD video and more in the future. The design ensures that hardware investments are maintained as operational needs evolve. Features of the RT-7000 include:
- Tactile and touch interface
- 29.7 – 960 MHz AM/FM P-25
- Trunking: P-25 Phase I and Phase II, SmartZone, SmartNet
- Ability to connect 2 external handheld radios
- Up to 3 built-in internal transceivers
- ON/OFF* COM and display
- Compliant with NVIS – MIL STD 3009
- Smaller form factor than nearest competition
- Embedded, Relay, Concurrent and Relay/Concurrent
- User control functions and operations supported within 3 menu selections
*TSO/ETSO approvals pending completion of FAA review
The RT-7000 is uniquely suited to helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft performing a variety of public safety missions, including airborne law enforcement, helicopter emergency medical services, firefighting, border patrol, search and rescue, electronic news gathering and surveillance, and manufactured by Cobham Aerospace Communications in Prescott, Arizona.
According to Cole Burdette, Chief Tactical Flight Officer, Air Support Division, LAPD, Cobham’s tactical communications products have been proven in service with the LAPD for many years, and the introduction of the Cobham RT-7000 Panel Mount Tactical Radio gives the department a complete mission capability, a vastly improved user interface, and an unparalleled upgrade path with the introduction of new technologies in the future.
Comments are closed.