I know some units in Chgo and other cities have ride-alongs, but does Chgo offer “fly-alongs”, where one can ride along in a chopper ? Or in any city, for that matter ?
Not allowed here for liability reasons.
Here comes a story:
A couple years ago, this college student was out on a ride along with a sheriff’s deputy. It was a really slow night and the deputy felt bad she wasn’t getting to see anything interesting. So he asked her if she wanted to ride in the helicopter. Of course she said yes.
The pilot, a friend of the deputy, was already in the air. He agreed to meet the pair behind a Wal-Mart. Yeah, no shit! Everything went fine. The girl got to see a lot of neat stuff from the chopper and she had a great time.
The problem was that neither deputy mentioned to her that this should be kept on the down-low. The girl wrote a letter to the Sheriff, thanking him for the oppurtunity to ride with a deputy. She went on to praise both the street deputy and the helicopter deputy for their kindness and professionalism, etc. And she explained what a great time she had in the helicopter.
The pilot was fired! I think he works in Africa flying security for some pipeline, now. Or something like that.
Ah… thanks for the reply…
Also, the CPD has no helicopter units… so there is that going against your chance.