The Town of Provost’s special constable, Jamie Erickson zeros in on a vehicle with a new laser guided device that will measure both distance and speed in a fraction of a second. RCMP officer Terry Link (in background) chats to a driver after he was flagged down minutes earlier. Story at right. ©Provost News Photo. Print version in March 14 edition of The Provost News. Want to Subscribe to The Provost News? Click here.

New Laser Gun Will Pinpoint Speeders in Town
The Town of Provost’s special constable has a new tool to control speeding drivers—a laser guided device that will accurately record both distance and speed in a fraction of a second.

Jamie Erickson, who is the special constable says the new unit will supplement his radar system that he will still use mounted in his car.

The unit was purchased in January but now with warm weather it has been getting more use and it was both demonstrated and put to use on Thursday afternoon, March 8 near the fire hall.

The device, when activated by a trigger sends a beam of light from a top lens to hit an object like car or truck with the light beam then bouncing back to inside another lens to show the precise distance away and speed of the vehicles pinpointed by a red laser beam picked out by the operator.

One of the advantages of using the laser gun is individual or even multiple vehicle selections made a split second apart to determine how fast the vehicles are travelling. If there are four vehicles travelling one right after another for example, in theory each one could be picked out and clocked at 0.3 seconds apart, depending on the speed of the operator. Vehicles can have their speed measured whether they are approaching or leaving the gun’s operator.

---