Welcome to The Hangar Z Podcast, brought to you by Vertical HeliCASTS.

In this two-part series, host Jon Gray sits down with Bryan Santy, the sergeant in charge of Anaheim Police Department's aviation unit. 

Santy has had a wildly successful law enforcement career. He worked his way to aviation becoming a pilot after working patrol and as a gang investigator. 

Santy was later promoted to sergeant and went back to field operations working as a patrol sergeant and supervised the Homeland Security detail. 

Santy worked his way back to air support and has been the sergeant of the unit since August 2010.

Anaheim PD’s aviation program dates to 1970, when they began the program flying two Hughes 300 helicopters. Today they go by the call sign Angel and are flying H125 (AStar) helicopters as well as a Cessna 208B Grand Caravan to assist in surveillance missions.

With its humble beginnings in 1970 to the current multi-category aircraft fleet, the Anaheim Police Department Air Support unit's primary mission remains to provide support to patrol officers. 

As the technology, aircraft performance and fleet diversification have advanced with crew training and professionalism, the unit has expanded its capabilities to support virtually any public safety aviation mission.

 Thank you to sponsors Bell, AEM and Dallas Avionics.