You should probably do a little research on how the contract to acquire these trucks is written before offering an opinion on what they may or may not need at a given time.

Seals dry rot like CRAZY if they dont get driven frequently. But that's beside the point. The maintenance is mandatory in the contract...whether it's "needed" or not. The feds drew up the contract thusly to make sure the contractor performing the maintenance has business for a while.

They can't afford it.

They will be in breach of contract.

Most departments have some form of limited use vehicle that doesn't get driven daily but is available when needed

No, However I do believe that Iowa's population seems more down to earth and mostly civil. I don't see a mass riot happening here anytime soon ( which I think would be one of very few uses these things would have in police force ), compared to what can break out in a place like L.A.

I don't believe that riot duty is one of the things LE agencies plan on using MRAPs for.

Then you haven't been paying attention to their list of excuses as to why they need them, since "riot control" is, if not the first excuse on the list, way up near the top.

I haven't seen any agency in any of these stories here state that its high on their list of reasons for getting one. The usual justification I see is active shooter incidents.

paul fitzgerald has used it extensively, as has the jasper co sheriff when i was chatting with mike about it.  even then, during an "active shooter" incident, you can't exactly drive an MRAP into a shopping mall, or elementary school, or any other building other than a barn.  the only time it actually works to protect anyone is when they're INSIDE the vehicle with all doors shut.  as soon as you exit the vehicle, guess what?

once again, MRAPs are nothing more than a ridiculous toy that's going to kill funding around the state.  Plates, carbines, and TRAINING will save far more officers' lives, far more inexpensively, than vehicles of war.

I guess those officers at Columbine who commandeered a n armored car did it wrong according to your play book.
It beats crossing open ground to enter/ exit an area or to retrieve personnel.

there are plenty of options for up-armored SUV's that accomplish the exact same task, and are far more easily maintained because they likely already have a technician on staff or contracted for their other vehicles who is able to work on SUV's.  Not to mention maintenance would be exponentially cheaper and less frequent.

Then of course there's the whole part where SUV's can go tons of places that MRAPs can't, especially in Iowa where plenty of rural areas can't be reached by MRAP at all due to weight restrictions on bridges.

There are plenty of smaller, less expensive options to do that with. An MRAP is not cheap to maintain nor good for the 'off-roading' that all the LE seem to think it is 'perfect' for.

The peoples republic of New York must be a lot more willing to let law enforcement do whatever they want 'for safety'...

The maintenance staff that works on highway equipment can work on MRAPs. As has been pointed out in past threads, many of the companies building the things in recent years used a lot of off-the-shelf components
How many active shooters are going to be out in the boonies? You might have a remote house, but any vehicle would face the same limitations in those environments



There are no cheaper commercial equivalents. Price out a Bearcat and get back to us

Not according to the contracts into which the LEO's who accepted MRAPs entered.  Maintenance is spelled out clearly in terms of who was awarded the contract from the federal government.  It's part of the lease requirements....maintenance must be done according to the frequency and fee schedule spelled out in the contract.  They're not ALLOWED to use the highway equipment people, even if they ARE certified on MRAP maintenance.

People keep mentioning these contracts. I haven't seen them; have you?
As I said in an earlier thread, these things aren't going to be driven a great number of miles, no matter how much dry rot you or others claim can happen occasionally, I don't see replacing a few seals, gaskets etc on a  regular basis is going to be that huge of a change from current fleet expenses.

Only the three a friend of mine at the Pentagon was involved with writing.  As much experience with the DC idiocracy as I have, I'm (very safely) assuming the rest of them are strikingly similar, given the good ol' boy stuff that goes on between the maintainers and the contracting officers.




You're still assuming, even after having been corrected by numerous people with more personal experience than you have, that somehow they're able to do the maintenance themselves.  THEY. CAN'T. DO. THE. MAINTENANCE. THEMSELVES. IT'S. AGAINST. THE. TERMS. OF. THE. LEASE. CONTRACT.  I'm typing it slower....hopefully you're reading it slower as well.

Just SHIPPING the MRAPs out for maintenance is going to exceed their available funding in a year.....let alone the maintenance itself.

Only tangentially on topic, but there are some stylin' armored vehicles for sale here.  I thought they would be more expensive.

Fleet maintenance is an on-going expense for any agency. We already replace a ton of transmissions, engines etc. The typical car in our fleet hits multiple deer every year and has to be rebuilt.

So you say agencies wont do the maintenance themselves. Like I said, its not like they'll be doing a whole lot of replacing of parts that simply wont be wearing out because the vehicles wont be driven a whole lot TO wear stuff out. A few gaskets, etc aren't a major expense when you're already replacing  ton of stuff in your regular fleet.

I haven't been corrected by anyone as far as the ability of fleet management to have the skillset to replace stuff outside of whatever contract might exist. The guys who work on our fleet already work on stuff bigger or equal in size to MRAPS . if they were allowed to work on these vehicles by whatever contract you claim will be part of the sales package, they're more than capable of learning the in and out of working on them as with any other large vehicle

I see this whole "contract" thing as just another excuse for the anti-MRAP crowd to hang their hat on.

The maintenance contract is just the icing on the cake.  The vehicle is very poorly suited for anything but probably survivability in an IED/Roadside bomb/Land mine or an ambush.  (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected= MRAP).  Can anyone intelligently answer the question of how likely the Police in Iowa are to experience either of those situations?  Every capability of the vehicle is a compromise in order to make it more IED survivable and bullet resistant.  Simply put,  IT SUCKS AT EVERYTHING ELSE.   It's too heavy.  It's top heavy.  It's maintenance intensive.  It's cramped inside but huge on the outside.  It's hard to drive safely.  It's easy to crash.  It causes a ton of damage to whatever or whoever it crashes into..  I can keep going for days with the negatives, and I can't think of any real positives, except it's somewhat bullet proof.  It's not a cost effective vehicle even if it is free.  

Training alone will save more lives than any amount of equipment.  This has been proven time and time again.

Don't forget its far from optimal for casualty evacuation due to its clearance height and narrow rear door.

Just about anything in the police fleet has narrow doors. Ever tried to shoehorn a large defendant in the back of most modern police cars?

Ever tried to lift a casualty 5 feet in the air.

They definitely needed it there-guy yelling and then refusing to come out of his house??Shoulda called in a drone strike............

Wow that's all it takes yell at some one have mraps and multiple agencies at your front door. What if there would have been trigger happy officer? Saying he saw a gun when it could have been a man eating a damn snickers or something. But yep let's militarize the police and when something gets brought up about it we will just turn the other cheek and say nothing to see here

Where there are no roads, you make roads.  That said, my fucking Subaru could have played around down there.  MRAPS aren't all-terrain vics.  With trained drivers, they can seem like them, but they aren't.
link to some fun stuff
I've never been so confused about LEO's and the shit they should be allowed to have.  I'm going to keep this going.

There are downsides to every vehicle.
Ambulances aren't exactly built close to the ground as far as getting patients into them either.
I'd still take an MRAP to extract someone over sending in an unarmored smaller LE car that doesn't have doors any more accommodating than the doors on an MRAP

I guess the answer is no then.

Maintenance on patrol cars, including replacing transmissions/engines and repairing collision damage is an understandable expense. The cost of the required maintenance of a vehicle with extremely limited usefulness to civilian law enforcement is not. Show me a legitimate, situation for an Iowa law enforcement agency to need these vehicles that is likely to arise and I'll shut up. They are piss-poor for mud/snow use, marginal for most anything else a police officer is likely to encounter-unless they need to hop in and run over a herd of rabid zombie deer.

Tc556 it's obvious that you are a police officer, as am I.  I've given examples of when this would have been useful, but it fell on deaf ears.  Just be thankful there are so many law enforcement experts here to set us straight.

Why do you assume that Iowa is somehow exempt from criminal activity that would rise to having usefulness for an armored vehicle?
Iowa is not alone in having four seasons, for example. Its not the stuff that officers are "likely" to run into that should concern us.
If we were "likely" to run into a particular problem only on certain calls we could leave the rest of our gear home the rest of the time.
This sort of gear is for the unlikely, the unusual events.
There have been enough first hand experiences posted in the various MRAP threads that all of you naysayers should be saying by now that LE does indeed have a need for this stuff.
You seem to think that Iowa is so crime free that you can predict that LE would never need specialized gear



Over the years I've had to assist with carrying enough dead weight and living patients around and through enough obstacles, tight corners, tight staircases, etc that I know full well what a body living or dead weighs and the problems associated with moving said body

I am used to it. I refuse to let the bashers hold the field of debate by virtue of our silence

I get the feeling that you guys would be here justifying anything the military/gov decided to give you...................

So we are bashers? So people that disagree with you are bashing cops, way to continue to the us vs them mentality.

You do realize that there a few people in this thread with thousands of hours operating these types of vehicles in urban environments, doing exactly the tasks Leo have stated these vehicles will be used for, and their reaction has been no fucking way.

Initially, I didn't think it was a big deal, I could see the very limited uses and the vehicles are paid for, but since then I've seen the dismissive attitude when those with experience tell the LEO about the shortfalls of these types ofvehicles. This type of attitude doesn't work around armored vehicles it gets people killed and maimed for life. We had a truck flip going 40 mph with a trained and alert driver. Put one guy in the hospital, this was on a truck that had daily maintence performed, how's it going to go with a guy that has min hours and a truck that hasn't moved since the fourth of July parade trying to get a shooting?

And I didn't even touch the leadership of Jasper county..

I've got quite a bit of time behind the wheel myself

I would say that the military camp falls into a wide array of beliefs on LE issues, and theres certainly a few of them that I would say qualifies them to be bashers.
I'm not surprised because there were all sorts of guys in military uniform in my experience.
I've arrested a few prior service guys over the years. One of the biggest low lifes I have to deal with on a regular basis was in my unit 15 years ago, was ate up and getting smoked by his PSG on a daily basis while he was in.
Now he rushes to drop my name when any LEO has to interact with him despite my repeatedly telling him to knock it off.

http://www.odmp.org/search?state=iowa&cause=Gunfire

Note September 13, 2013 and April 4, 2011.

These things aren't just some truck that happens to be armored as well. They require tons of maintenance, they break frequently for no apparent reason, and require LOTS of training to operate safely and effectively.

I'm not against LEO's, I just don't think they know what they are getting themselves into training and maintenance wise. The last thing I want to see on the front of the local newspaper is that 4 LEO's and 3 citizens are dead because the MRAP they were driving down a flooded road rolled over in the ditch trapping all inside.

Are you saying an MRAP would have saved them?

Hoing and Rice were shot on a loud party call, so no, WPD would not have dispatched an armored truck to a loud party call.

Barricaded subjects where you have time to deploy this type of vehicle are the most likely scenario justifying its use. I don't see them as being very useful in a riot, unless the rioters start throwing explosives or begin firing at law enforcement or the public. In most cases it takes too long to deploy an armored vehicle in active shooter situations.

Still if the costs are reasonable it may be useful in protecting lives in certain situations. Since they are now becoming ubiquitous we will soon find out how they are going to work out in the real world and if they are cost effective. Many departments ended up with surplus helicopters, but when they found out how expensive they were to maintain most of them quit using them.

The one situation pointed to in an earlier post shows actual use and because the officers had no way to be certain if the father had bad intent and could have had firearms it seems reasonable they used it. Just because some relative tells them he has no firearms in the house does not mean there aren't any.  The relative may not know about it, and of course relatives do lie to "protect" their family members.

According to the neighbor the man was acting erratic, yelling and screaming before taking his son into the house. Once that is reported to law enforcement they are going to check it out. They are going to make contact with the dad, even if he doesn't like it because he "hasn't done anything wrong". If he had simply come to the door with his child and talked to the officers to clear up the situation the MRAP would have never been used . Had the officers gone away when he refused to come to the door and something happened to the child the public would have crucified the officers.

Jesus, it's like talking to a private.

that little snippet there dishonors their service and memory...  i'm no LE hater, and i'd argue most all in this thread aren't either, but that comment is pure bullshit.  for the love of God, i was one of the first in the whole state to sign up and receive my fallen officers plates through the COPS chapter...  

if everyone in this thread is assuming that all military are qualified to shoot stuff and all LE aren't qualified to use an MRAP, we're making a bunch of assumptions.  it seems like the thread is heading in a shit direction.  instead of getting pissed off at one another in the community circles we all tend to agree upon, let's throw this back on the failing political class that keep putting us all in the middle.  the mustaches who dream this shit up and say yes are the problem.  have MRAPs at every other podunk national guard unit with a fence so you can borrow one whenever you need it.  problem solved.  why all the 'civy' hate?  

and to directly respond to the link quoted above...

sergeant stein caught one right off the bat to a nut when the deputies were simply doing a 'knock and talk'...  those guys got out the vehicles and it was on...  no MRAP would've done dick.  stein got out of his vehicle and WHAM...  officer buenting walked by a window.  he was the second to do so.  the first officer walked by, and the nut inside the house saw movement and when jamie walked by, WHAM...  again, no MRAP would've changed that outcome.  

if you have an example that is legit, i'd agree with you 100%.  there are times, although rare, that an armored type vehicle is warranted and necessary.  to draw the flawed conclusion that MRAPs would have made ANY impact on the outcomes of those two officer's lives is not only irresponsible, but total bullshit...

you might as well be showing pictures of dead kids after a school shooting, clamoring for gun control on the deaths of children with statements like that.  that's fucked up man...

Have we even discussed level 1 maintenance?  This stuff PMCS(preventive maintenance checks and services) have to be performed everyday.  A properly maintained MRAP, expected to be driven at any moment, would need at least one hour of an officer's time everyday.  Would his labor unions have an issue with him crawling underneath the MRAP greasing nipples every Monday morning?, or would they just have heavy truck dudes subcontracted to support this?  I really don't think some people have any idea how much you have to take care of these monsters.  

OK, credentials time.   US Army 40 hour MRAP drivers course grad, DVE driver's instructor(40 hours) and US Army drivers badge holder.  I've been licensed to operate the RG-31, RG-33, M1A1/M1A2 MBT, M3A1 CFV, M-113, every series of HMMWV's, STRYKER, Cougar(4x4, 4x6), Caimans(all types), and many more others, basically I'm pretty much a SME on these things, it's kind of my fucking thing.

These things will take more lives than save, I fucking guarantee it.

eta:  As in take more lives through operator error.

From what I've read here it seems like these things cannot sit long periods of time without maintenance and still be expected to perform.  With that in mind also considering the "maintenance contracts" mentioned here it seems this was the federal governments best option to keep these maintained and ready for use if they ever need them again.  

The problem is in doing so they put them into the hands of a bunch of untrained leo who now have a new toy looking for a reason to use it.

I'm with you on this and greatly appreciate everyone's input that has knowledge about these things.  I was only trying to guess at the federal governments thinking behind this and not saying I agree with it in any way.