Huntington Station test for ShotSpotter

Shots will be fired near the Huntington Station railroad station Thursday morning as police test a new monitoring system to pinpoint when and where shootings take place.

At least two bullets from a 12-gauge shotgun will be fired into a vehicle specially designed to contain the shots, a county official said.

It will be the first demonstration of the ShotSpotter gunshot detection technology approved by the Suffolk County Legislature for Huntington Station and other areas.

The system was activated Friday, almost a month after a triple shooting that remains under investigation.

It happened less than a mile from Thursday's test location, injured three young men and yielded three arrests.

"We want to make sure folks know that the next time a tragedy happens, we will have the system working," said Paul Perillie, a spokesman for the legislature's Majority Leader Jon Cooper (D-Lloyd Harbor).

The surveillance equipment captures explosive sounds through sensors, and uses software to determine the location and relay that information to law enforcement, according to SST Inc., the company leasing the technology to the county.

Insp. Edward Brady, commanding officer of the Second Precinct, which polices Huntington Station, said last week that ShotSpotter "will allow us to respond to these incidents faster."

Dolores Thompson, co-chairwoman of the Huntington Station Action Now, a town-appointed committee studying ways to make the hamlet safer, said, "It's pretty sad that we have to reduce ourselves to this. However, if it's necessary and it would help deter some of the crime that we are experiencing and the violence, then we can do it."

The 9:30 a.m. test will take place near the intersection of Columbia Street, Lowndes Avenue and Railroad Street.