The RCMP were on the ground and in the air for training exercises in Butter Pot Park today.

The exercises use police dogs and helicopters to help track “suspects” hiding somewhere in the area.

Sergeant Will McGinness is a member of the RCMP’s Emergency Response Team in Newfoundland and Labrador.

He says the RCMP does the training twice a year as part of recommendations from the MacNeil Report into the shooting deaths of the RCMP officers in Moncton in 2014.

RCMP conducted a scenario for media earlier today, in which they made use of both a helicopter and police dogs to track and arrest a suspect.

Sergeant McGinness, says both the helicopters and dogs complement each other’s weaknesses.

For example, the dogs are great at tracking, but if a suspect were to hop on an ATV the dogs would lose the scent. That’s where a helicopter would be beneficial in finding the fugitive.