Police Aviation Research has announced the completion of another highly successful PAvCon Police Aviation Conference to an International gathering of police aviation professionals from 25 nations.

The PAvCon 2012 took place in association with the German Federal Police at their Hangelar, Bonn police air support headquarters facility in Sankt Augustin, Bonn, Germany over the recent Jubilee Festival holiday.

The event was primarily sponsored by Zeiss Optronics with additional support from Churchill Navigation, Diamond Airborne Sensing, L3 Wescam and Thommen Aircraft Equipment and media support from Police Aviation News and Police Oracle and Police Product Insight

The Keynote presentation was provided by Thomas Striethoerster Head of Directorate 2, Federal Police HQ with a supporting hosts presentation given by the OIC Bundespolizei Aviation Wing Colonel Thomas Helbig.

A varied two day conference room programme centred around a theme of Crew Resource Management [CRM] and supported by 23 industry exhibitors and an outdoor static display wholly attracted to the PAvCon event—the first occasion where the PAvCon has attracted such a stand-alone display.

The primary aim of PAvCon Conferences is to provide the best possible location for the delegates from police and industry to meet and Network together in the most amenable conditions. To this end this is not simply a daytime programme of conference presentations spread over two days, opportunities are provided for business related meetings to take place at pre-show and evening events over 3 days.

The organiser of the PAvCon Conference, Bryn Elliott, said “The actual extent of the growth of this years event was something of a surprise and will be a hard act to follow next year. We are extremely grateful to the Bundespolizei for their enthusiasm and assistance in making this years gathering such a success”

The 25 nations attending included representatives from Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Cyprus, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, England, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, United States of America, Wales and included 21 members from FRONTEX and the majority of the European Union Police Nations among nearly 200 attendees.

The static display included aircraft displays from Aerodata, Eurocopter, FLIR Systems, Indra/Tecnam and Vulcanair and included the recently delivered Vulcanair P68 now operated by Hessen Police and the latest Indra concept surveillance aircraft based on the Tecnam P2006. Fixed wing aircraft accessed the police heliport from the adjoining Hangelar civil airfield. In addition the facility offered access to 40+ airframes [AS332/EC120/EC135/EC155 and historical airframes] in the facility tours provided by the hosting Bundespolizei.

The ADAC HEMS Academy based on the adjoining Hangelar airfield provided a presentation of their CRM training facilities within the conference programme and backed it up with a delegate tour of their training facilities and Cue Sim flight simulators during the Day 2 midday break.

See also http://www.pavcon.org