"Helicopterless" Norway & the Utøya massacre

[MacCruiskeen]

Good to see you, Gnomad. Thanks for the info.

Regarding use of force by police, it is indeed very different than in the states. In Finland, officers cannot shoot to kill even when there is an armed perp, except to protect life - their own or that of others.

This was clearly precisely such an exceptional case. Dozens of dead already, and the gunman still on the loose, still shooting constantly at hundreds of other, trapped, children.

And immediately after the bombing of Oslo, many cops were indeed carrying guns, and they were obviously on high alert. It was an exceptional situation, precisely that.

PS They didn't even necessarily have to shoot to kill the gunman on that island. Maybe they could have taken him alive, maybe they could have disabled or intimidated him, maybe he would have had to be shot dead quickly. Maybe he would have surrended immediately, as he in fact did.

But certainly none of these options was available without armed officers actually being there. So they had to get there very quickly indeed, and they didn't.

Of course, helicopters would have helped.

[Gnomad]

Sure. In that situation, shooting the gunman is perfectly allowed.

[MacCruiskeen]

Breaking:

27 July 2011 Last updated at 17:53 GMT

Norway commission to investigate Breivik attacks

Norwegian PM Jens Stoltenberg has announced the creation of a "22 July Commission" to investigate Friday's bomb and gun attacks.

[...]

The speed of the police response to Anders Behring Breivik's second attack, on Utoeya island, has been questioned.

[..]

The BBC's Jon Brain in Oslo says the overall police operation has been criticised, with questions asked about why it took so long and why a helicopter was not available to allow police to get to the island more quickly.

[...]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14317271

Maybe barracuda can explain things slowly to those quaint, naive Norwegians and educate them as to why their anger is misplaced. Then they can spare themselves that inquiry.

Edits: no edit, i just fucked up trying to quote myself one day later

[ninakat]

Mac, I want to correct you on one thing. You're not being paranoid (as you stated in the other thread). It's called healthy skepticism, and I appreciate you raising these important (and obvious, I would have thought) questions.

[MacCruiskeen]

Thanks, ninakat. If I said I was paranoid I'm sure I was just being sarcastic. Because how could I possibly doubt that everyone always has my best interests at heart?

Sorry, I'm being sarcastic again. Got to dash, anyway. I'm due to meet somebody a mile away in two minutes' time, so I'm going to follow Delta Force's elite example and walk there backwards.

[Nordic]

i think comparing and evaluating their institutions and culture on imperial US or British templates tends to bring confusion.

I think this is the main problem in both of these threads. We who grew up watching cop shows and movies think that all around the world there are police in command of fully fueled and warmed-up helicopters, just waiting to take off at a moment's notice.

I've flown in a helicopter. It's not something you rush into. They're fucking dangerous. The one day I rode in a helicopter I almost died because the extremely experienced pilot ran into a telephone line. I should be dead, actually.

What I see going on in these threads is a heavy cultural bias, people living in what are basically police states wondering why the non-police states don't have cops, muscles twitching, sitting by the phone waiting to leap into action.

Also, the Elephant in the Room which nobody seems to bring up, is that there was something of a HUGE HUGE diversion two hours before the massacre, namely a huge fucking bomb blast in downtown Oslo.

Those who weren't on vacation were scrambling around, looking up what they were supposed to do in these situations, trying to do it, then wondering WTF this thing was about a shooter on an island.

Now what do we do? Call Olaf! Olaf's on vacation. Shit. Who else do we call? I don't know! Where's the helicopter? I don't know!

I mean, c'mon, it was Norway. A completely different world.

It's difficult for us to even CONCEIVE of cops NOT carrying guns.

Yet everybody thinks a bunch of unarmed cops should have just gone face-first into a hail of gunfire?

Most cops aren't the bravest people. They're bullies and they're cowards. They play it safe. On any given day, they're just at work, on their job, wanting to get through the day and they can't wait until their shift is over, just like everybody else. You want them to go throw themselves into a bunch of gunfire, you'll probably see some resistance.

There's also the denial aspect. Nobody wants to believe this kind of shit is actually happening. I was once doing a shoot in East LA (gangland) and some kids came out from around a corner and started shooting at some of our crew, who were setting up some lights on top of a hill. It was very difficult to believe that was actually happening, even while it was happening and even afterward. It just seemed so bizarre and almost comical. The kids were like 12 years old, but shooting real guns. I was thinking "that HAS to be fireworks of some kind".

On edit: I am certainly not defending the cops. The opposite, actually. But I think it's unrealistic to expect cops in Norway, in the middle of summer (and summer is pretty short there), after a huge terrorist attack on their government buildings has them all in shock, to operate at anything approaching what we in police states would consider "normal" levels of kick-ass.

[Stephen Morgan]

i think comparing and evaluating their institutions and culture on imperial US or British templates tends to bring confusion.

I think this is the main problem in both of these threads. We who grew up watching cop shows and movies think that all around the world there are police in command of fully fueled and warmed-up helicopters, just waiting to take off at a moment's notice.

I don't think they stopped making The Bill because of the prohibitive cost of all the helicopter assault sequences. Maybe in America cop shows are full of that sort of thing, like 24, I mean I've seen Bad Buoys 2, but not really here. The only English cop show that often has helicopters in is Police, Camera, Action, which is a "documentary". And any attitude I have towards the prevalence of helicopters is drawn from the fact that I am constantly harrassed by them, as they regularly feel the need to fly over my house looking for corpses. AWACS planes, too, loads of 'em around here.

I've flown in a helicopter. It's not something you rush into. They're fucking dangerous. The one day I rode in a helicopter I almost died because the extremely experienced pilot ran into a telephone line. I should be dead, actually.

What I see going on in these threads is a heavy cultural bias, people living in what are basically police states wondering why the non-police states don't have cops, muscles twitching, sitting by the phone waiting to leap into action.

Also, the Elephant in the Room which nobody seems to bring up, is that there was something of a HUGE HUGE diversion two hours before the massacre, namely a huge fucking bomb blast in downtown Oslo.

Obviously the first logical response to a massive bomb is to stand down all of your helicopters. Just a bomb, lads, won't be needing you today, get off home.

Those who weren't on vacation were scrambling around, looking up what they were supposed to do in these situations, trying to do it, then wondering WTF this thing was about a shooter on an island.

Now what do we do? Call Olaf! Olaf's on vacation. Shit. Who else do we call? I don't know! Where's the helicopter? I don't know!

I mean, c'mon, it was Norway. A completely different world.

It's difficult for us to even CONCEIVE of cops NOT carrying guns.

You know Mac's Scottish, right? Cops don't carry guns, except the specialist gun-cops, anywhere in Britain. Maybe London, I haven't been there in about fifteen years, but not in the civilised parts of the country.

Yet everybody thinks a bunch of unarmed cops should have just gone face-first into a hail of gunfire?

Most cops aren't the bravest people. They're bullies and they're cowards. They play it safe. On any given day, they're just at work, on their job, wanting to get through the day and they can't wait until their shift is over, just like everybody else. You want them to go throw themselves into a bunch of gunfire, you'll probably see some resistance.

There's also the denial aspect. Nobody wants to believe this kind of shit is actually happening.

Smacks of the classic "conspiracy theories are just comforting for people" approach to debunking.

I was once doing a shoot in East LA (gangland) and some kids came out from around a corner and started shooting at some of our crew, who were setting up some lights on top of a hill. It was very difficult to believe that was actually happening, even while it was happening and even afterward. It just seemed so bizarre and almost comical. The kids were like 12 years old, but shooting real guns. I was thinking "that HAS to be fireworks of some kind".

On edit: I am certainly not defending the cops. The opposite, actually. But I think it's unrealistic to expect cops in Norway, in the middle of summer (and summer is pretty short there), after a huge terrorist attack on their government buildings has them all in shock, to operate at anything approaching what we in police states would consider "normal" levels of kick-ass.

I think the bullies and cowards would have leapt at the opportunity provided by the bomb to go into full ready-to-kick-ass mode, with the guns and the oaklands, and helicopter assaults.

[Joe Hillshoist]

What I see going on in these threads is a heavy cultural bias, people living in what are basically police states wondering why the non-police states don't have cops, muscles twitching, sitting by the phone waiting to leap into action.

Thats a rather interesting observation.

[barracuda]

You know this? No.

You know this? No.

You know this? No.

You know this? No.

I'd forgotten I wanted to respond a bit to this interestingly repetitive post of Mac's.

...civilian choppers were available in their hundreds, including big robust personnel-carrying ones. See my first three or four posts for the evidence.

What I'd like to examine is just how much time responders might have saved by using a commandeered civilian helicopter. Let's use the wikipedia timeline for purposes of standardisation, even though there are others that suite my purposes better:

17:07: Breivik arrives at Utøya, where he asks the young people present to gather around him for information.[8] Shortly after arriving on the island, he starts firing at bystanders.[9] Initial calls to the emergency services are dismissed in order to keep the line clear for calls about the Oslo bomb.[13][14]

17:27: The local police district in Buskerud learn about the shooting, and three minutes later the police in Oslo are informed.[10]

So here is the point (17:30) at which the police in Oslo might begin checking for the availability of their standard chopper, from the 330 squadron, and find out it is unavailable, for whatever reason.

17:38: Northern Buskerud police district ask Oslo police district for assistance.[15] Beredskapstroppen (the Contingency Platoon) is dispatched from Oslo to Utøya.[10]

IRL, the Beredskapstroppen have left by car from Oslo, eleven minutes after they found out about the incident. My question would be, in those eleven minutes, could they have located a civilian chopper to carry the troops and equipment and organised the pickup of their men and material? I'm very doubtful. Even of they located an available civilian chopper within five or ten minutes, it would have to be prepped. Prep to lift-off is usually fifteen to thirty minutes, but let's say it might be unsafely done in ten. So the civvie chopper is still on the ground at where ever they located it by the time the Beredskapstroppen leave for Utoya. At the very best, we're now fifteen minutes (5 mins. to locate, + 10 minutes to prep) from the point at which the Oslo police began checking for civilian helicopters, which puts us at 17:45, the chopper is still on the ground at it's home airport.

Now it has to lift off, go where the elite troops are, land, and load the men and material. Let's say that the civilian pilot can do this is ten minutes or so. That seems amazingly fast, but okay. Now we are at 17:55 in our hypothetical and finally leaving Oslo.

17:52: The first local police car arrives at Tyrifjorden, but the officers have to wait for a suitable craft before they can cross over to Utøya.[12]

18:09: The Contingency Platoon arrive, but are also forced to wait for a boat.[9]

Alright, IRL, the Beredskapstroppen are at the lakeshore, aimlessly boat-hunting. It's 38 kilometers from Oslo to Utoya, so the trip by copter at 200 km/hr average speed takes between 10 and 15 minutes. In other words, 18:10, and the civilian chopper is now hovering and beginning to lower the platoon members onto the island, for a total savings of fifteen to twenty minutes, because at...

18:25: The Contingency Platoon arrive on Utøya and go ashore.[11]

I think I've been extremely fair in my alotments of time for each phase of this comparison against the wiki timeline, and have condensed or even omitted aspects of the logitistics of commandeering civilian aircraft which might be faced, such as chain of command issues, and other contingencies. If you disagree, tell me how, so I can reassess. (Whether the wiki timeline is really accurate is another discussion.)

Now consider that the Beredskapstroppen are really only late to the scene in real life because of the problems finding a boat. Had a servicable boat been available, they would have very nearly arrived at the island at the same time as a similar crew choppered in from a civilian source, or so it would seem from this exercise. In other words, the decision to drive doesn't seem so bad, and if you're looking for a place to lay the blame for their lateness, the boat is probably a more reasonable suspect than the fact that they chose to drive to Utoya, at least within the terms of the possible use of a commandeered civilian helicopter. I'd say even subtracting five or ten minutes from the hypothetical helicopter timeframe doesn't turn driving into a really horrifyingly bad decision.

[tazmic]

"Now consider that the Beredskapstroppen are really only late to the scene in real life because of the problems finding a boat."

Beredskapstroppen has two Rigid-hulled inflatable boats. The type has three engines with a total of 675 HP.

Where were they?

[Dradin Kastell]

"Now consider that the Beredskapstroppen are really only late to the scene in real life because of the problems finding a boat."

Beredskapstroppen has two Rigid-hulled inflatable boats. The type has three engines with a total of 675 HP.

Where were they?

Presumably, somewhere on the sea coast. Around Oslo harbour, say. Maybe even afloat, but it is also possible they are in storage somewhere in the capital area.

You can see the actual boats in the article from 2006 that seems to be the original source for Wikipedia information about these RIB boats:

http://www.phs.no/bibliotek/phsbibl/prosjekt/artikler/fulltekst/beredskapstroppen2.pdf

[MacCruiskeen]

"Now consider that the Beredskapstroppen are really only late to the scene in real life because of the problems finding a boat."

Beredskapstroppen has two Rigid-hulled inflatable boats. The type has three engines with a total of 675 HP.

Where were they?

Presumably those boats fell off the roof of the car while they were driving from Oslo to Utoya. Could happen to anyone, so let's not be be mean.

Don't any of you know what Norwegians are really like?

Nordic at least has read some history. As he so wisely pointed out, Norwegians are hobbits, or rather Teletubbies. Because although bad things sometimes happen to hobbits and they manage to cope bravely & resourcefully nonetheless (Bilbo Baggins is just one verifiable historical example), Teletubbies are merely naive cuddly harmless creatures who play all day, and nothing bad has ever happened to them. That's why they just kind of squeak and sigh and hug each other all the time, so obviously they can't be expected to run trawler fleets, build oil rigs, join NATO missions, form Death Metal bands, paint famous pictures of people screaming, write famous novels about hallucinating under the effects of hunger, or travel the world speaking admirably fluent English, German and French, much less respond quickly and efficiently when hundreds of frantic callers tell them someone is massacring their children at his leisure.

If you even bothered to read the papers, you would know that Norway is the Land of Innocence (Now Shattered). It was never invaded and occupied by the Nazis, for instance, unlike the USA. Norwegian police and emergency services have never had to cope with dangerous gunmen, or oil rig disasters, or severe winters, or climbers trapped on mountains, or huge disco fires, or anything like that. They just expect everything to be nice all the time.

Old Europe... It's undeniably quaint, but the inhabitants are really kinda wimpy when you get to know them properly. They're not like Real People, you know. Ask Nordic or barracuda, or anyone else who's spent some serious time there.

NEXT UP: The French. We'll bring you fully up-to-date on their typical baguettes, bicycles, accordeons and berets, plus their incorrigible penchant for cheese and surrender.

[MacCruiskeen]

Some historical photos:


A typical native of Scotland (right)


A typical native of Greece (left)


Two typical Icelanders stalking a wooly mammoth

[Burnt Hill]

Mac, I dont agree with you.
But I enjoy your sarcastic wit so much that I wont argue with you.
But then I feel guilty for enjoying anything related to this tragedy.

[MacCruiskeen]

For air transport Beredskapstroppen uses military Bell 412 SP [HELICOPTERS] from the RNoAF.


CAPTION:Norwegian Bell 412SP helicopters taking part in the NATO exercise Strong Resolve 2002

For air transport Beredskapstroppen uses military Bell 412 SP [HELICOPTERS] from the RNoAF.[Royal Norwegian Air Force]

From the RNoAF [Royal Norwegian Air Force] Aircraft Inventory (here at Wiki), we learn that they have not only eighteen (in figures:18) Bell 412 SP helicopters in service, but also six (in figures: 6) Westland Lynx helicopters and twelve (in figures:12) Westland Sea King helicopters in addition to that.

That's thirty-six (in figures: 36) helicopters in total.

About the RNoAF's twelve (in figures: 12) Westland Sea King helicopters:

Owned by The Royal Norwegian Air Force and the Police. Its main role is search and rescue, but undertakes some military missons, such as transport, and support roles for the civilian society including the Police in counter- terrorism operations.

A Westland Sea King helicopter: