![NSW Police PolAir Senior Sergeant Brett Degenhardt using night vision goggles that helped find (main) a missing bushwalker in the Royal National Park on May 26, 2024. Pictures supplied NSW Police PolAir Senior Sergeant Brett Degenhardt using night vision goggles that helped find (main) a missing bushwalker in the Royal National Park on May 26, 2024. Pictures supplied](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/rdPnbxNSt95RbDXSGgzrdz/ce317963-d382-47e6-99dd-2c98bb3f1083.jpg/r0_0_2400_1349_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Specialised equipment made for the United States Defence Force helped find a missing bushwalker lost in the dark at Otford.
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At $25,000 each the 15 sets of night vision goggles don't come cheap, but Detective Superintendent Brad Monk said they are an absolute game changer for the community and to help keep crews safe in the air.
Just before 7pm on May 26, police rescue crews were called to a man lost in rugged bush west of Werrong Beach in the Royal National Park.
It was the first time PolAir crews had tried out the new NVG and they were quickly able to spot the 36-year-old man near a creek line. Rescue crews were winched down to Werrong Beach, with two officers then forced to trek through the bush to find the man.
"Without the goggles we don't fly below 2500 feet [762 metres], with those goggles and with permissions through CASA, it allows us to go below those heights," Det Super Monk said.
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"It allows us to then get at a much lower level and and complete rescue missions, land on the ground and deploy resources."
The goggles have specialised cameras that help identify a person's heat signature and at night it shows up as bright white amid the darkness.
"It's next level," Det Super Monk said of how the technology changes everything for crews.
"If you're up in the Blue Mountains [at night] it's a black abyss from above.
"It allows night to become day, in that darkened environment you can't see anything unless it's lit up."
Not only can officers spot people needing rescuing and offenders more easily in the night, it helps them identify power lines, trees and other hazards so flights are safer for crews.
The technology has been so successful for police officers, that the FBI has already paid a visit to PolAir's base at Bankstown Airport, with the US Consul General Christine Elder also set to pay a visit.
Search and rescue missions jump 300 per cent
Five years ago the NSW Police Aviation Command were deployed to about 500 search and rescue calls a year, that's skyrocketed to more than 2000 annually.
"No doubt population growth, demographic changes also, with a lot of people coming to Australia and not understanding our country and not understanding the geographics. Often people are very unaware of good bush sense and even the surf.
"Our searches can will range from an old person walking out of a nursing home with dementia getting lost, to people falling into the water at sea, going into dams inland, and just simply getting lost in the bush or getting injured into the bush as well."