I just watched a police standoff on MSNBC in which several SWAT officers apprehended a gunman, and one of the SWAT men was wearing shorts (even though his torso was armored and he wore a helmet.) It was the first time I’d ever seen that. Why did that one guy (and only him) have shorts on?
It’s hot outside?
But seriously, why not? A helmet and body armour are the only thing that will protect you from firearms. As far as ballistic protection goes, trousers make no difference - in fact you’d be better off going naked except for the armour, so as to prevent cloth fibres getting into any flesh wounds.
Most people in those teams situation would wear boots, gloves, trousers etc to protect against minor irritants such as scrapes or powder burns and to look more intimidating, but if someone feels they’d be more comfortable and effective in shorts and sneakers then why not wear that?
Too slow AGAIN :mad:
He left his Stormtrooper helmet back at the bar?
[sub]Star Wars joke.[/sub]
I didn’t see this standoff, but I’ll add another possibility. It’s possible this particular officer is assigned to Bike Patrol or Beach Patrol or similar patrol where his duty uniform includes shorts. So if he was on duty when he got the Call-Out, he would have arrived to the location in this uniform and just grabbed his tactical equipment off the SWAT truck. And for reasons stated above (no major protection afforded by pants) he didn’t bother changing.
Maybe when he got there, it seemed like more of a pain in the ass or more likely too time consuming to remove his boots, take off his shorts, put on his pants, and put his boots back on.