tonight in South Yorkshire Sierra Yankee nine-nine sky cops are under pressure cracking down on car theft guiding in the dogs sniffing out the criminals by day there is an expectation that when the helicopter arrives on the scene of an incident were there to pull the rabbit out of the bag [Music] [Music] [Music] 10:00 p.m. Sheffield for many criminals it's the start of their working day in Rotherham the car thief is on the run [Music] Yankee nine-nine has the car in its sights but this criminal is driving like a lunatic he's now on the wrong side of the road police cars are trying to get alongside to force him to stop [Music] [Music] don't think they're good drivers at all and very dangerous very responsible they've no no respect for life going through red traffic lights at 60 70 mile an hour there's only gonna be one winner out of that amazingly no one has been killed or seriously injured but for once Yankee nine-nine has not been able to make a difference I don't see them driving in a noble manner the problem with me is that I see them driving in just so dangerously that they're actually prepared to lose the life to get away from a police officer they're very very critical incidents and probably more critical or s critical to firearm incident while the ground cops pick up the pieces nine-nine returns to base to refuel but tonight there's little time to consider what happened another car chase what a stolen one this time but three men have dumped it and are out and running on the ground it's virtually pitch-black it's 1 a.m. 99 s thermal-imaging camera is what's needed it's worth its weight in gold ruler because any searching that that's done is totally reliant on the thermal-imaging camera we can get overhead and within minutes we can search vast areas of land many many gardens and and determine whether or not there's anything there that's giving off a heat signature the white blob on top of the wall is a cat watching the drama unfold towards the car just fortunately a ground cop is nearby the nighttime does give a lot of criminals an extra element of cover but it also gives us a helping hand in so much as that people that are out and about in the Earl is at early hours of the morning or either milkman policemen or villains as the search for the other two Runaways continues PC Humphries has spotted something suspicious a wheelie bin a favorite hiding place for car thieves we need a wheel a big check in place they some do feel present or possibly course Avenue by rejoyce the tyranny backs off to this failed place with a thermal image camera you have to work hard to try and determine what it is that you're looking at you're not looking at a picture of light you're looking at a representation of heat and although the human body gives off one heat signature there are lots of other things that give off the same temperature you can find yourself looking at a heat source in a garden for quite some time trying to determine what it is and very often the easiest way is to direct an officer into the heat source and get them to have a closer look the search has been going on for 15 minutes there's no sign of the suspects and the residents of the estate are starting to come out in force [Music] but PC Humphries believes some of the residents are trying to help him there were some people in the area that were indicating closer to the scene of the abandoned car and so we began to concentrate a little more on that area [Music] behold there was one of the occupants of the vehicle two naked eye you couldn't see and yet we were literally feet from even if it actually stood on him and once I've seen it was that well concealed by the bushes Charlie go but there are places that you can hide from the eye but the the heat-seeking capabilities of the camera see through all those bits of camouflage and and we find people in all sorts of places as 2:00 a.m. rolls around the clubs of Sheffield are turning out most of the revelers take cabs home but not the drunk in this car he decided to drive home stole a cavalier XLR and is now being chased by police and Yankee 99 also on the tale of the drunken driver is PC Skagen Sam's over the limit it was disqualified drive it was a prolific offender he was trying to just get away whatever it whatever means possible [Music] [Applause] the trunk has taken a risk too far skidding as he runs out of Road a chance for PC scuppered I mean he was prepared to risk his life he was to try to get away from us I mean it was one of the the dangerous pursuits though I've had in the last 12 months jutice speed alone due to the weather conditions he was just going horrific the quick PC Skadden's got a problem a front tire is going flat he's going to have to stop the police car in front is being driven by PC Jim Lucas and the thief has turned on to school playing fields and all this feel quite well and it became apparent to me I once put on the field the driver had become disorientated to illuminate the area the crew of 99 turn on their powerful searchlight known as the night son we tend to use it to assist the people on the ground either illuminates in large areas of land or bringing down to a narrow beam and use it as a pointer so it's it's a piece of roll equipment that we use with a little bit of thought the drunk is no longer thinking or driving straight PC Lucas is so as a cat it slowed down slightly I was in a position to go up to the side of the driver's door basically it collide with it and shove him into a Shama ditch even in the ditch the thief is refusing to leave the car fortunately help is it hurt when you get driving this so bad and that this person has wanted for other offenses it's very satisfying you know the end result is look we've got him his income it's a great feeling to catch them and turn to get him stopped I mean it wasn't a new car but that's someone's pride and joy and there's a sense of pride and joy inside the cockpit [Music] [Applause] 8 a.m. a chance for the night and day shifts to spend some time together yeah we usually try and eat together when we can there's usually a small window of opportunity way so right it's quiet grab a meal usually breakfast on a day shift and with all fine get stuck in before the work starts it's usually quite a slow start in the morning we get the the main admin out of the way getting the aircraft checked getting all the fuel checked making sure all the documentation is up to date and then we can sit back and relax waiting for a job coming in it's usually about midday before you really start to get any heavy workload but this morning there's no time to relax the unit has gone to the dogs before the call start coming in the duty crew are going to take Max and his handler for a training flight the dogs are you've missed it he knows that that the furry exercise recently fluo a very experienced police constable who initially was very apprehensive about the flight and afterwards thanked me because he said all that's fast smooth and I thought it would be so he was anxious whereas his dog was good as bill as we all know there's no rush to this kind of operation at all it's not like in the movies one is running in and running out and war zone stuff we're not sitting in that game at all I mean we want to go through the practice deploying to an area where we're gonna have a simulated suspect who Max's ain't gonna track max is flown in the helicopter quite a few times in fact when this force took on the new helicopter max was the first dog gear to fly in it I think he's now tagged as air dog marks look out for gentle buckets break have a look it out man the dogs are very predictable they're extremely well controlled however we put a rubber match down in the back of the aircraft so they don't catch their claws and the the freight rails and they are tethered as well because we don't like the idea of the dog getting loose in the cockpit especially that would be somewhat undesirable when the alicante deploys it makes life a lot easier as a dog handler it's very time-consuming to search wide areas using the dog allicattt conceal the overall picture excellent maxim has flown in the helicopter quite a few times in fact you've seen dogs in the backs of cars with the window down giving the opportunity I'm sure the dog would have added that out to the window at police headquarters they're calling for police dogs and Yankee nine-nine access control to Syrian another car chase and the pursuers believed the thieves were about to stop and run for it so we dropped the training immediately and diverted to go to the live job and we got there just in time to see the car come to a stop the crew believed the thief is going to run right through the woods to seek refuge in the houses behind like he doesn't but the chasing ground cop does the police dog hand was on the other side of the wooden and he wouldn't have known which way to go here that we're talking thousands of square meters of search area the driver was actually only hiding literally six foot away from us with the helicopter brothers book the it was that thick the bushes we couldn't see anything and so we hold it over the top of the wood and literally set left a bit right a bit right he's in front of you [Music] within seconds of putting the dog into the to the woods he's found him this is no training exercise the man is wanted for breaching a court order right the only problem with a helical sometimes you have your money or pill and down dale because they've got a nice horse and it turns out to be a cat or a rabbit or something i think up a towering over you just enjoy watching your own running around like headless chicken on the money the easy start of the day has long gone a car has been stolen in Sheffield 99 is being refueled captain Moo setscrew have taken the call [Music] but there's another problem there is a strong smell of fuel in the cockpit it is actually strong as I've ever heard [Music] Neil said it was a really really strong it's making his a boss an actor now from the front travel look in his eyes were literally streaming with the films that obviously the vapour from the fuel yeah we grounded it the job that we lifted for they actually detained the tool that we'd gone for anyway so that's why we came straight back but we've we've got a slight problem with the aircraft so that's where I would come straight back in there in London the technical problem couldn't have come at a worse time in Sheffield there's been a spate of house burglaries during which the keys to luxury cars are being stolen pc s-- cupboard has been told to try and catch those responsible he was counting on help from nine nine very very well organised about in excess of half million pounds worth of cars tape over last month in history than the way wolf caught them he's on the road while astra taking the vehicles without limited success with forensics so it's all about being out there and dealing with them catching up while they're doing the act I've got some intelligence suggests that there's been a vehicle stolen with its keys I believe from a burden that's been put on false place I'm a criminal on the che green area field [Music] the rope crammed units are going into the area with full traffic cars on the play and vehicle to see if we can resume Klaus if you find it these people who were target at the moment we know that they've been offended and been bent course on the task for car crime and there's other get harder to catch hard to catch we need a little bit more look every time but Lady Luck isn't with them today yankee nine-niner fuel smell was caused by a leaking valve she's grounded the problem we've got is the access to this valve if I can get it out without lifting this floor that will save us a deer's down track it's now a race against time the engineers think they know that it's the rollover valve that's the problem if they can change that without taking the floor up then that would be great I think they put this valve in and then don't the aircraft around the world and we've got to take the floor up then we need to take everything out the back of the cab remove the flooring and solve the problem that way no one knows how long this is going to take the stolen car PCC Auburn's been looking for has been located and headquarters once 99 to help it's pretty demoralizing really you sat here all day we've got bits and pieces that we can be doing but our job is to fly in the aircraft and it's not available we can't really go anywhere and do anything else because it could be ready at any time and it's just playing the waiting game really we just sit around bored meanwhile PC stubborn and an unmarked police car have got the stolen car trapped or so they think yeah [Music] when it's gone long here sometimes you see them took another profession the moment is out of sight till last night this vehicle was pursued and lost it is a total of now access we're calling up the shoe the floors gonna have to come off [Music] sometimes you know people are gonna get away and no matter what you do they may take that extra risk that we're just not prepared to take and the officers on the ground aren't prepared to take but you can always go about the next day and the next day until they finally get them believe it well I noticed nothing before locking doors and then flipping smashing the way out at 99s base there's a breakthrough they won't have to take up the floor after all one trouble fuel valve we got another will fit it they all we get on because we have three engineers that work with us all the time you build up a relationship with them you trust them brace it CLE with your lie just makes that part of flying that little bit more comfortable fitting the new valve is one thing getting 99 back on duty quickly another they must test it first and that means giving the engineer a spin Oh Oh if there's anything still wrong this will flush it out back on the streets of Sheffield another cars gone missing was a car stolen from a burglary that is a density off to this normal place changed we did have a little bit of intelligence that the car was was in the area and we picked up on it which rocked on with it on the web there at the airport the test is complete Yankee nine-nine is free to help pcs govern [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] as PC scuffin goes after the thief on foot Yankee nine-nine is overhead at last he saw someone gonna steal mr. car but you will follow it and then another heat source about 50 yards in front to that I just wanted to know if they were still in situ or if it was still moving on the ground reinforcements are arriving and the big search is underway a number of suspects are in the frame PC scuffin is not a happy man it looks like his thief has got away you can't I mean you just can't compete with the fact that you have a stolen vehicle to me look at that meat of course the trees straight through no I'm like a barrier sore head when they're when criminals get away from me it's just something I don't deal with very well and that's sort of declare war on them I'll go after him if I know if I've got a suspicion who that person is and I can't prove it at that time I should be in the area because these people always really the crew of Yankee 99 haven't yet given up they're still looking I've got the heat source which is too strong to be people so i can assume that's the car I think got another heat source containing we'll get a dog in look at me those I'm just I'm all sweaty and I need a beer they know the car owners and they send these traffic cars easy and they know that if it goes long enough they know they've got the helicopters going to be above them was helicopters on top of them will never ever get away from it's not been a great day for the South Yorkshire Police but there is some good news where the thief ran away from the stolen car he left a vital clue behind his phone marvellous if a day offenders left his mobile phone in there in the vehicle well hope to bring an arrests quite similar that one the runaway driver that was pushed into the ditch by PC Jim Lucas was convicted of dangerous driving the man hiding behind the hedge was found to be the passenger of the stolen car and was not charged and the driver sniffed out by the dog got 12 months and disqualified from driving for a further two years [Music] [Music]