A Special Operations Group officer once remarked he felt his job was safe compared to police on the road doing routine patrols.

"We do our homework and we control the situation. Out on the street anything can happen," he said.

He said the closest he came to serious injury was when, as a young constable, a man pulled a knife on him at a railway station.

On Tuesday a 31-year-old First Constable was shot in the head in what should have been a routine intercept of a suspect car, the sort that happens hundreds of times a day.

An occupant in a suspect Ford Escape opened fire with a shotgun in Robinson St, Moonee Ponds around 3.40am, shattering the driver's side window and striking the policeman in the back of the head as he instinctively turned away from the blast.

Almost certainly the window saved his life.

This was no warning or accident. The offender intended to kill.

The crime itself was inevitable with police discovering guns every two days in cars in Melbourne's north-west.  They deal with firearm-related incidents like drive-by shootings every six days.

In the Frankston area police have also seen a spike in low-level ice dealers now carrying firearms.

Part of it is "gangster chic" where wannabe crooks carry guns as fashion accessories. Another is an underworld arms race where criminals carry guns because their enemies are armed.

Certainly some Middle Eastern crime gangs routinely shoot rivals in the legs as an intimidation tactic.

Senior police say courts should be tougher on offenders carrying guns where it should be accepted that if they are armed they are prepared to shoot.

Police are being trained through Operation Catch to improve their observation skills in order to identify suspect drivers who may be carrying drugs or firearms.

While the rate of police being targeted by armed offenders remains low there can be no doubt the risks in law enforcement is on the rise.

In September last year Abdul Numan Haider, 18, lured an Australian Federal Police officer and a Victoria Police member into the Endeavour Hills police station car park with the intention of stabbing them both to death.

He wounded both men but was shot dead before he could complete his deluded mission.

In October last year, Sergeant Rob Campbell was shot and badly wounded with his own weapon as he tried to disarm a 150kg knife-wielding offender.

Every hour police are dealing with people so disturbed or drug affected the suspects need to be hospitalised and recruits in the police academy are now being trained in techniques to deal with the profoundly irrational.

And because of the risks of terror attacks police security has been increased with solo patrols banned, motorbike units to  work in pairs, front-counter police to be armed and uniform police must to wear ballistic vests.

The challenge for new Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton is to protect his workforce without over-reacting.

In the 1980s, after the Russell Street bombing, and Walsh Street, where two police were ambushed and murdered, and the wounding of seven police by gunman Pavel Marinof, senior police restructured survival training along the US model.

It resulted in a spike in the number of suspects shot by police and a need to rethink training methods.

Melbourne remains a safe city. Police can not afford to develop an us-against-them mentality.

And crooks need to know that if you shoot at cops it will end badly - for you.