As much as we all hate the reality of it, active shooter events aren’t going to go away. It is our responsibility to be as prepared as possible and to support/assist those responsible in potential target locations in their planning and preparations as well. To that end, this supplement’s goal is to provide straight-forward, contemporary information on:
- Recognizing the reality of existing potential for events,
- Awareness of minimal equipment needs and some discussion about
- benefits thereof,
- Challenges of managing the response from a command level, and
- Challenges of recovery and return to “normal.”
In this Active Shooter Response Supplement you’ll find information about those topics and some commentary on past events with lessons we should have learned from them. I say “should have” because there are still some agencies, agency supervisors, front line officers, school principals, faculty, staff, parents and others who all maintain the comforting (albeit utterly false) outlook of “it can’t happen here.” If they go so far as to think “it can happen here,” they may continue in the comforting belief of “it won’t happen here.”
It is our duty to mentor those folks; to coach them. It behooves us to be as gentle as possible in our approach but we have to get them to see and accept their responsibility in recognizing reality, planning for the eventuality and supporting us as we perform our duty in protecting them.
I’ve been an active shooter response instructor since 2000 when I took that first instructor level response course. I’ve studied and written about these events as they’ve occurred. I was on scene at Virginia Tech two days after that attack occurred and have dissected that response (it was awesome on the part of the law enforcement agencies involved) for presentations and articles.
What most of us train for—the immediate response to contact and neutralization—as important as it is, represents a small fraction of our duties surrounding such events. Our involvement has grown from that initial call to action and now includes planning assistance, community interaction, actual response planning, recovery direction, coordination of multiple law enforcement and non-law enforcement agencies and more. Even the front line responding patrol officers are being more widely trained to deliver basic trauma care so we can minimize losses due to avoidable causes like extremity blood loss and shock.
As you read this, don’t just cruise through the words and think, “I already knew/did that.” Look for the parts you hadn’t considered. Look for the information you can share. Use this as a resource to take to meetings with educational representatives to help them realize the full scope and magnitude of what surrounds active shooter preparation.
STAY SAFE.
—Lt. Frank Borelli,
Serving since 1982
This article is part of a series of articles dedicated to responding to and prevention of active shooter events. Download and share the entire series here.
