By MONROE ROARK
Staff Writer

A Tyrone police officer walks behind a department store and finds a drunk trying to break in. The officer shouts for the man to stop and show his hands, and he responds by dropping a knife to the ground, or coming at the officer with the weapon, or coming from behind a dumpster with a gun drawn.

Any of these scenarios would require a split-second decision that could mean life or death. Fortunately, in this case they all took place Friday morning in the safety of a darkened room in a trailer with the perpetrator only an image on a large video screen.

Officers from area police departments visited Fayetteville last week to utilize a unique training facility operated by the Toccoa Police Department. A $200,000 computerized mobile shooting simulator provides officers with literally hundreds of possible situations to test their reflexes and decision making in one of the most state-of-the-art interactive videos anywhere.

As the Tyrone officer mentioned above took her turn in the approximately 400-sq. ft. carpeted room with the floor-to-ceiling video screen, Toccoa's Lt. Butch Newkirk, a 22-year police veteran, was at the controls of the sophisticated computer in the next room. Developed by a Los Angeles police officer, it recreates nearly 100 incident scenarios with five possible ways for each one to turn out, depending on the officer's reaction.

With the click of a key, Newkirk can direct the villains on screen; for instance, a group of men exiting a bank, coming out with guns blazing or their hands up. A group of punks loitering in a parking lot can fire at the officer or simply get in their car and drive off.

The officers in training use special weapons that shoot a laser at the screen so the computer can identify its trajectory and whether it hits the target. Shell casings are discharged just as when firing real bullets on the street.

The computer, though, is unique in that it can shoot back. A small barrel above the screen can zero in on an officer who is not properly taking cover behind one of the two carpeted barriers provided and fire a round plastic projectile at an exposed knee or arm. Newkirk says he never aims for the head or the chest, but these babies are felt no matter where they hit.

The computer is even smart enough that two officers can participate in the same exercise and it will know which officer shoots which bad guy.

Newkirk said the mobile training unit, one of only 12 in existence, is in constant demand around Georgia and outside the state as well. It is an extension of a large training facility in Toccoa that regularly trains SWAT teams and other officers in a variety of police courses.

All 39 officers of the Fayetteville Police Department visited the training facility over the course of two days, according to Lt. Tom Kirkbride. In addition to Tyrone, the cities of Palmetto and Senoia sent their officers there as well.