Material witness

Two

police forces are running trials of a vehicle marking material that will allow them to distinguish between pursuit cars and offenders during chases at night and in bad weather.

The marking, developed by Qinetiq, is undergoing six-month trials with Cambridgeshire and Hampshire Constabularies.

The material allows the roof markings on vehicles to be read with a thermal-imaging camera. This should enable air support police co-ordinating a chase in helicopters to distinguish between the pursuer and the pursued, said Dr Andrew Loveridge, project manager for the material, called Mirage.

‘When a chase involves multiple police vehicles there is sometimes a difficulty in co-ordinating the chase, because you can’t tell which is the lead car and which is the second car without turning on the spotlights, and that blows the cover of the helicopter. Anything that means the helicopter can be used in a covert manner is of benefit,’ said Loveridge. ‘One air support manager I spoke to claimed they had in the past accidentally chased unmarked police cars, because they locked on to the wrong vehicle.’