SWAT Team Descends on Bradner

By Russell Walsh - Bradner, BC - A police SWAT team showed up at Dave Graham's place on 58th Avenue, a while back, leaving Bradner residents wondering just what Dave had been up to now. What trouble had he managed to get himself into?

​Dave's place is of course the home of Cougar Welding and everyone agrees that Cougar Welding' work is second to none. Professional welding done in record time. So what brought out the SWAT team? A bad weld, perhaps? A job gone bad? It must have been a really bad weld for this much armor to show up! Some even wondered whether an episode of '24' was being shot at Dave's house, and they eagerly anticipated seeing Jack Bauer or Chloe O'Brian or even CTU head George Mason. But wait. George went down in the Mohave desert, piloting the plane with the nuke in the back seat, so scratch George Mason.  ​

Neighbours were definitely perplexed by the intense action. Men in camouflage rushing about with assault weapons, and an assortment of nasty looking police vehicles that would frighten young children. 

The action began early in the morning when some very serious looking police vehicles showed up at Dave's place and men dressed like they worked for CTU hopped out and began charging the door of Dave's old house with what looked like a modernized version of a medieval battering ram - the kind of device you see in movies when enemies or tax collectors want to bash in the door of some castle and get the inhabitants.

There was a lot of shouting and yelling, too, as the camouflaged SWAT fellows charged about through Dave's house. We suspect the swat 'ninjas' were all 'fellows' but with all the camouflage it was really hard to tell whether they were in fact all fellows. However, no tests were performed so we presume they were all fellows. The action brought an air-show flair of excitement and anticipation to Bradner and some residents even brought along chairs and a tables so they could sit on Dave's lawn and get a front row seat to the goings on! A large sun umbrella was raised, affording spectators protection from the sun. Like Abbotsford streets during the annual Air Show.

The mystery was finally solved when Dave fessed up. It turns out that he had built a replacement house on his acreage, just south of the old house. Since the latter was slated for demolition it presented the Abbotsford Police with an excellent practice site for the training of the local SWAT team and so they approached Dave requesting permission to kick in a few doors and for a bit of training practice. We suspect Dave's only complaint is that the old house is still standing, leaving him with the chore of completing the demolition ; )

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