When RCMP Cst. Dawn Adams responded to a call to check on the well-being of a man slumped over a table in a restaurant, she did everything right.
She woke him up, asked him questions and had him empty out his pockets. As he was putting things on the table, the man dropped a small piece of folded-up paper on the floor — an action that looked deliberate to Adams. So she picked up the paper and unfolded it, and a cloud of white powder exploded in her face.
Adams immediately felt dizzy and nauseous, and could barely stand. "I felt this sense of helplessness and I immediately felt vulnerable, which is probably one of the scariest feelings in the world as a police officer because you're not in control," says Adams, who works in Kelowna, B.C.
The white powder was fentanyl, a deadly opioid 100 times more toxic than morphine. In its pure form, it can kill an adult with as little as two milligrams — the equivalent of a few grains of table salt.
Shortly after this incident, the RCMP released a video aimed at informing first responders and the public about the dangers of fentanyl. Adams' story is featured in the video.
RCMP Commr. Bob Paulson has no illusions about the gravity of fentanyl. "The danger this drug presents to all Canadians cannot be overstated," says Paulson. "It's spreading across the country, leaving a trail of misery and death, and first responders need to know that even being near it can make you sick, or worse."
The video was the first step. In the fall, RCMP released a training course for naloxone, an opioid antidote, and distributed naloxone kits to members across the force.
Adams was familiar with the antidote as she was treated with it at the scene by paramedics and immediately felt better. So when she heard about the training and the naloxone kits, she understood how important it was.
"Crime, criminals and the drug scene is always evolving," says Adams. "For us to keep safe and come home at the end of the day, we need to keep up with that. It's imperative."
A killer threat
Sgt. Luc Chicoine, the RCMP's National Drug Program co-ordinator, and Bruce Christianson, director of Occupational Safety, have been working on fentanyl-related training for more than a year. This one file takes up most of their time.
"We're into a wave of the population being hungry for a new high," says Chicoine. "This year we're expecting more than 1,000 deaths related to fentanyl in Canada. It's a killer."
Training for the naloxone nasal spray consists of a 30-minute online course. It describes everything from the signs and symptoms of opioid exposure, how to respond, the steps to take before administering naloxone, how to administer it and the side effects and mitigation strategies.
Guidelines for the safe handling of the drug have also been distributed to members of the RCMP. The training materials are available to police services across the country on the Canadian Police Knowledge Network website.
While naloxone can reverse an overdose in minutes, putting it in the hands of front-line police officers is just the first step. "It's a big step for the RCMP, but it's a Band-Aid solution," says Chicoine. "We've addressed that because it was crucial for public security, but now what we're faced with is how we handle fentanyl from the get-go, when the investigation starts."
The National Drug Program is looking at all the issues from how to analyze a white powder — Christianson says that they have to assume the worst — to how to seize, manage and store the substance.
"It's extremely complicated because contamination just takes a minute, but we're working on it and addressing every question," says Chicoine.
Crisis calls
Fentanyl isn't the only challenge that police officers are facing with increasing frequency. Calls to respond to people experiencing a mental health crisis are also on the rise.
Cpl. Cara Thomson, a mental health liaison from the Ridge Meadows detachment in B.C., says the role police officers play when they respond to these calls is critical.
"These are the cases that could go sideways," says Thomson. "We need to have a lot of awareness of these conditions and how to work positively with people who have mental health problems."
A new national, mandatory course, Crisis Intervention and De-escalation (CID) training, will help officers when they encounter these situations.
The course was first developed in 2012 for all police officers in B.C. following recommendations from the Braidwood Inquiry, which examined the death of Robert Dziekanski.
When the RCMP's Contract and Aboriginal Policing was tasked with creating a national, crisis intervention and de-escalation training course, they adapted B.C.'s online course, which became available for all RCMP employees in September.
Cst. Lara Davidsen, the RCMP's CID co-ordinator in B.C., says that ongoing training provides police with the tools to meet the changing needs of their communities.
"CID training provides members with additional skills in recognizing and communicating effectively with individuals in a mental health crisis," says Davidsen. "Taking the time to communicate, de-escalate and build rapport with a person in crisis often results in a successful outcome for all involved."
After Thomson completed the training a few years ago, she recalls responding to a call involving a man with a knife. He was clearly distressed, ranting and holding the knife by his side.
Thomson arrived at the call and instead of rushing into the situation, she spoke to him from a distance. "Most of the time, they don't drop the knife the first time you ask them," says Thomson.
CID training, in addition to speaking about mental health disorders, focuses on talking and taking the time to assess the situation, which is exactly what Thomson did. "And I just kept talking," says Thomson. "I used the de-escalation techniques and he put down the knife."
In her position, Thomson responds to mental health calls every day. She says she's seen a positive change in how police officers react to people in crisis since the course became mandatory in B.C.
"There seems to be a better understanding that a person [might be] dealing with mental health issues and they'll give a little bit more, they'll talk more and spend more time assessing people rather than rush the call and take them to the hospital," says Thomson.
Davidsen, Thomson and other front-line subject matter experts are working with Training Services on a new, advanced mental health intervention training course to build on CID training for RCMP police officers in B.C. "It would be for general duty police officers who are interested in mental health to get even more into it," says Thomson. "We're constantly working on making the system better."
An innovative approach
While officers faced with new threats and challenges benefit from enhanced training, a changing environment also presents learning opportunities for police.
In 2010, when he was a member of the Collision Reconstruction Team in Saskatchewan, S/Sgt. David Domoney saw the potential in using a remotely piloted aircraft system (RPAS) to take aerial photos of a collision scene. He thought the technology would be especially useful in rural locations where there's no access to a fire truck. He wrote a business case, did a feasibility study and acquired a single RPAS.
"We learned very quickly that the potential for this data that we can collect from the air is very cost effective and poses very little risk to our members and the public," says Domoney.
It didn't take long for use of RPAS to take off and quickly expand to other areas of policing including major crime scenes, emergency response team activation, and search and rescue.
In 2013, an RPAS was successfully used to locate a Saskatchewan man who had been injured in a single-vehicle crash.
First responders couldn't locate the man, who'd wandered away from the scene. Cpl. Doug Green flew an RPAS with a heat-signature camera over the scene and found him about three kilometres from the crash.
That unit now sits in the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Virginia as the first documented use of an RPAS to save a person's life in a search and rescue.
Domoney is now the national co-ordinator for the RPAS program at RCMP Headquarters in Ottawa where he oversees the national policy, standardization of equipment, training and operations for the technology.
The RCMP recently developed its own National Pilot Ground School Course. Domoney says it's not just police officers who can be trained as RPAS pilots; civilian members and public service employees can, too.
Candidates are taught the basics including the rules of flight along with sessions that review flight planning, airspace management, general theory of flight and weather patterns.
"We started out with one single RPAS in December of 2010 and that has grown now to 160 aircraft across the country," says Domoney. "It's basically the largest fleet of RPAS being used for public safety in the world."
With the technology getting better all the time, Domoney predicts there's a lot of more that the RCMP can use RPAS for that he hasn't even thought of yet.
"We're on the cusp of working on various projects that will greatly enhance our investigational capabilities," says Domoney. "The sky's the limit with RPAS."