By CHRIS HUNTER

Salina Journal

The Smoky Hill Air National Guard Range and Crisis City, located west of Salina, and the unmanned aerial systems program at Kansas State University at Salina offer a wealth of training opportunities to military groups and first responders from across the country.

"With everything we have here in this area, unlimited things are possible," said Frank Coots, manager of Crisis City. "People can get a very diverse training out of the entire complex.

While the 36,000-acre weapons range has been in the Salina area for many years, Crisis City, opened in 2009, and the unmanned aerial systems program are putting Saline County on the cutting edge of technology and are drawing groups from around the world for training exercises.

In July, 600 first responders from Kansas and Nebraska came to Salina for an exercise.

Crisis City diversity

Crisis City, a project begun by retired Maj. Gen. Tod Bunting, offers training venues that include a rubble pile, a simulated grain elevator and even a pipeline. Coots said the pipeline is operated by electricity and can spray a mist or discharge the scent of natural gas.

"This is the only pipeline venue like this in the country," Coots said. "It is controlled by an electrical box that will automatically throw the switch. Most others are hand-controlled to go off."

One of the newest pieces of equipment is an air fortress -- a powerful wireless Internet antenna that provides Internet access to every inch of the facility.

"It is used to simulate how emergency responders will hop onto the nearest wireless Internet to get and send information," Coots said.

Crisis City also is equipped with the Salamander ID system, which creates identification cards for people entering crisis areas. Salamander recently was tested during a multistate training exercise by military units checking-in the vehicles and personnel.

"It creates ID cards that have all of a person's credentials on them," Coots said. "The card can then be scanned into the system and tell the person who is in charge what capabilities a person has, and they can tell them to go to the staging area."

Coots said Salamander can be used remotely to scan an area and locate all vehicles and personnel -- even those in the field -- and tell the coordinator exactly where certain people with certain qualifications are. The coordinator can then locate those people and pieces of equipment and send them where they are needed.

"This is one of the things that came out of Greensburg," Coots said. "There were so many people there with different IDs, and you didn't know if they were really supposed to be there or not."

Coots said the state will standardize IDs so they can be read anywhere in any of the state's 105 counties by a Salamander system.

Simulating situations

Crisis City's MILO system simulates various situations that military, police and other responders might come across and uses different lethal and nonlethal force for training.

"People think Crisis City is just a World War II barracks and rinky-dink building," Coots said. "It is more entrenched in technology than anyone would think that hasn't seen it."

Developing the future

One of the newest things Crisis City is working with is unmanned aerial vehicles and systems.

"Any time we have exercises going on, I coordinate with Great Plains Joint Training Center. If there is something going on with UAVs, they may or may not fly over and capture what is going on," Coots said.

Josh Brungardt, UAS program manager at KSU-Salina, said the unmanned aerial system program has expanded because of the proximity to Crisis City and Smoky Hill Weapons Range.

"The possibilities are infinite for us," Brungardt said. "With the assets and abilities we have, we have seen our program in two semesters grow three-fold. We are one of the first programs in the country to do this."

K-State students have begun developing new types of unmanned aerial systems.

The school currently has a certificate of authorization from the FAA to fly unmanned aerial systems from the school to the training areas at Crisis City and the weapons range.

"We have done some exercises out there, and in the near future, we're starting to plan more exercises out there in conjunction with the training and the Guard," Brungardt said.

Brungardt said the unmanned aerial systems have become useful in training of first responders. Currently, the FAA doesn't allow many nonmilitary agencies to operate UAS.

"It helps people training because it gives a situational awareness they have never had before," Brungardt said. "It becomes a tool to them that makes their awareness so much better to decide where to use assets."

Brungardt said first responders could use cameras and other systems on the UAS to decide whether to go into specific buildings.

Master Sgt. Eric Jones of the 284th Air Support Operations Squadron said his group also has started using thermal imaging in training. Thermal imaging helps the military locate enemy targets, similar to the way night vision was used. The thermal scopes have gone from the size of a suitcase to the size of a rifle scope.

"With night vision, it is not like you turn it on and everyone glows white like on "Call of Duty" (a Black Ops video game)," Jones said. "You get night vision, and a cigarette may pop up from a mile and a half, but if a guy is not smoking, it doesn't help. With thermal, we can see what position he is in and what he is doing. It is very difficult to evade thermal."

Working together

Jones said Crisis City has become a valuable asset to the weapons range because the facilities can be used to create a realistic scenario for military exercises. Using K-State facilities and research makes training even better.

"It could all possibly be tied together in the future," Jones said.

As technology continues to advance, Brungardt said he expects partnerships to grow closer.

"As a training center, and the assets we have in our own area, it makes us one of the best in the country," Brungardt said.

nReporter Chris Hunter can be reached at 822-1422 or by e-mail at chunter@salina.com.