Positioning the field with a bird’s-eye view

I could hardly make out my apartment from that high up, but sure

enough I spotted my bright yellow scooter sitting on my second-story

patio.

“Everything looks so different up here,” I told the helicopter

officers who were generous enough to provide me a bird’s-eye view

from Newport-Mesa’s Airborne Law Enforcement program, also known as

ABLE.

The program is a collaborative effort between Costa Mesa, Newport

Beach and Santa Ana police departments to provide more effective and

faster response to various calls for service. A police helicopter

regularly patrols Newport-Mesa and parts of Santa Ana every day from

about 1 p.m. to 3 a.m., stopping for fuel about six times throughout

the day at either Costa Mesa or Newport Beach police departments.

My column two weeks ago basically complained about the noise

generated as a result of living about 200 yards from the program’s

most-used fueling station at the Costa Mesa Police Department. I’m

guaranteed a low-level fly-by at least five times a day, with the

last one coming between 11 p.m. and midnight.

I would never call for the program to be grounded, I just wanted

some much-needed beauty sleep.

ABLE officers offered to give me a different perspective of the

helicopter law enforcement program, so I joined Newport Beach Officer

Ed Walsh and pilot and Costa Mesa Officer K.C. Gleason for a shift in

the chopper.

From that altitude, Costa Mesa looked like a quilt, constructed of

geometrical pieces of colored rooftops and patches of grass. It was

hard for me to get my bearings until I could see a landmark like City

Hall or Triangle Square.

Gleason took us from over my Fairview Road apartment to the heart

of the Westside in mere seconds. Once there, we circled high above

Pomona Avenue and 19th Street, and Walsh broke out the binoculars to

get a closer look.

He explained that from the air, an officer gets a unique

perspective on body language. If they see something questionable,

they radio to a patrolling police car to take a closer look -- all

the while keeping a bird’s-eye view on the situation.

Walsh focused in on two guys on bikes who would have never caught

my eye. He asked Gleason to keep circling the area. We watched to

make sure they weren’t just riding up and down the street, or looking

in windows, or checking for unlocked doors, or otherwise casing the

neighborhood.

“Looks like they have a defined destination,” the officers

concluded, and we moved on.

We flew a large circle over a broad portion of the Westside that

Gleason said is known to be a hot drug-dealing area. Walsh looked for

people who might be trying to hide various packages in secluded areas

or those whose body language indicated they were waiting for a

possible drop off.

The helicopter circled once more but things were quiet and we

traveled to the beach.

Walsh and Gleason pointed out rip curls, which from the air are

very highly visible. I saw very clear circles of turbulent water.

Walsh took out the binoculars again and took a closer look at the

swimmers near the tumultuous patches of water.

“We want to make sure they are on some kind of a board,” Walsh

explained, saying they usually tend to let surfers take the riptides

at their own risk.

ABLE officers can also radio lifeguards to let them know a swimmer

could be in danger or that they have spotted a lone child wandering

aimlessly up the beach.

“Take a look in that second-story window,” Walsh told me while

giving me the binoculars.

“I don’t think I’m doing it right, I can’t see anything.”

“What do you see?”

“Glass.”

“Exactly,” Walsh said. “That’s all we can see too.”

By the end of a slow shift, we had been called to assist in the

search for a robbery suspect to provide air coverage of three

collision scenes. In each instance, we were the first unit on the

scene, even though we were covering three times as much ground to get

there. And each time, the ABLE officers helped ground officers know

exactly where to set up, what was going on, how many vehicles were

involved, whether they could cancel, or should add, another

responding unit.

“Next time we wake you up, think of us as your guardian angels, up

here making sure everything is OK,” Gleason told me.

That’s comforting, I thought. But I like to think of them as

offensive coordinators. It’s an analogy that offers a little more

action and toughness.

It is clear to me that having the ABLE program allows Newport-Mesa

police officers to read the blitz and know when to put a receiver in

motion.

Now, maybe I can just sleep with earplugs.

* LOLITA HARPER covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

574-4275 or by e-mail at [email protected].