Welcome Edge Tactical Eyewear to Team One Network

We want to welcome Edge Tactical Eyewear to Team One Network.  This year at the Team One Network Instructor Conference we had two new sponsors cover subjects that we address in all of our Instructor courses, but haven’t had a recent update.

Kevin Hayes of Edge Tactical Eyewear conducted a presentation about protective eyewear. His first comment was,

“My Department Doesn’t Buy Sunglasses.”

He explained this is his typical response when he demonstrates eye protection.  He consistently learned first-hand through personal meetings, product demonstrations, and observing first responder training exercises that most senior leaders at these agencies have placed little to no value in providing proper eye protection for their personnel.  He gave a list of reasons and examples of why first responders don’t wear eye protection.

Here are a few reasons first responders don’t wear eye-protection

• Individuals who do not wear prescription eyewear typically resist wearing bulky, uncomfortable, constant fogging, poorly-designed, low-visibility safety glasses

• Individuals who have never experienced eye trauma have no frame of reference for the permanent damage that can be done to the eyes by any number of foreign objects.

• Individuals are not required to wear proper eye protection unless in controlled training activities such as a weapons firing range.

• Individuals resist the typically high cost of personally purchasing proper eye protection

• Agencies have received little to no training, and provide little to no training on eye safety to their personnel, as in the differences between sunglasses and proper eye protection.
When participating in training with Team One Network there only a few courses that do not require wrap around eye protection. Kevin’s presentation hit home with all of the Instructors. Team One Instructors have been issued multiple sets of Edge Tactical eyewear. We also have samples of Edge Tactical eye protection that are available for students to use during training.