Waynesville SWAT competes in national tourney
The Waynesville Special Response Team recently went up against dozens special ops units and SWAT teams from across the county in the national SWAT Round-Up Competition, nabbing the accolade of “Best Small Agency.”
A small agency is defined as 100 or fewer officers — Waynesville is the smallest small agency ever to compete in the SWAT Round-Up.
“We have always felt we had the best of the best serving in Waynesville, now we have national recognition of that fact,” said Mayor Gavin Brown.
The Waynesville team was put through the paces of various rescue scenarios that required rappelling, scrambling walls, traversing high wires, hitting sniper targets, scaling towers and more — all while under enemy fire and fending of surprise ambushes. One rescue scenario included a simulated chemical attack.
Waynesville Police Sgt. Brandon Gilmore said the officers who make up the team train almost every day, year-round. Their know-how in tactical techniques is a benefit to the community if something ever happened needing high-level special response, Gilmore said.
“Without the support from this agency and the opportunity to get top notch training, none of this would have been possible,” said Gilmore.
This is the seventh year that the Waynesville special response unit has participated in the SWAT Round-Up held in Orlando.
