Issue: Responding at high speed to calls in high crime areas.
Like other police officers, Deputy Daniel D'Agostino wonders whether he will get to the scene in time.
He carefully judges his speed and the situation around him.
He does everything possible to make sure that other vehicles and pedestrians see him coming... and stay safely out of the way.

Approach: D'Agostino says Martin County officers have an advantage today that they didn't have before. "There's a tremendous difference with the LED lightbars we bought from Code 3," he says.

"We see motorists react from a safer distance, pulling over to give officers more room. Before, they saw us from 25 feet away. Now it's 300 to 400 feet - up to 4 blocks away," he says.

"With older lightbar technology, they didn't see us until were right on their bumpers," he adds."Officers would have to take one hand off the wheel at high speeds to activate the siren. Coming from so close, the lights and siren startled drivers and caused accidents."

Captain David Lipker is in charge of the uniformed patrol as well as the fleet in Punta Gorda, so he appreciates that LED visibility comes with "low maintenance, no moving parts and less drain on the battery."

Martin County Fleet Manager Carl Amerson agrees. "These lights are brighter, but they don't require as much amperage. Anything we can do to reduce amperage draw is great."

"Another big issue in Florida is how fast lenses wear out with the heat and the salt. The Code 3 lights have a clear cover so we expect them to last longer." Amerson adds.

Results: Major Mark Faucett cites a key advantage he has seen in the three years St. Cloud has used Code 3 Model 2100 lightbars.

"Police officers love them because they can be seen faster, but also because these lights drain less electricity from police vehicles that also have to power laptops, sirens, radar and radios," Faucett says.

"They can't risk a power failure that would shut down all those critical functions at night on a stop," he adds.