Active Shooters

[MJS]

This is something that certainly is no stranger to LE, as many of these incidents have happened all over. The front page of my newspaper, is talking about the Sandy Hook school shootings that took place last year, in Newtown, Ct.

While not much has been said about it yet, although I predict it will happen sooner or later, is the time that it took for the police to enter the building. According to the paper, the first officer arrived at the school at 9:39am. He parked approx. a quarter mile away from the school, and as other officers approached, they made their way on foot, to the school. They entered the school at 9:44am.

I've read that the Police Chief and Union reps, are defending the officers actions, in the face of some questioning why it took the officers so long to enter.

So my question for the LEOs on the forum: What is your protocol for active shooting situations? Do you enter right away, wait for back up, etc?

It would seem to me that while on the surface, you'd want to get someone inside the building as soon as possible to hopefully put an end to the situation, that waiting for backup to arrive, would be the best thing. Not knowing what you're walking into is certainly a dangerous situation. I'd think that having at least 1 other officer with you, would be better than going in alone.

 

[jks9199]

There's not a set answer anymore. When I started as a cop, the answer was sit tight, contain the situation, and wait for the SWAT guys to show up and save the day.

Until that didn't work so good.

Then we learned and practiced ways to deploy with several officers.

Until that didn't work so well.

Then we learned and practiced deploying in smaller teams.

We'll do that until it doesn't work so good...

The answer is to assess and make what seems the best call you can, balancing your safety (yeah, we do get to try to go home at the end of the day!), your partners's safety, and the public safety. In one case, that may mean drive a cruiser through a store window and deploy on top of the guy. In another, it may be wait for your partner, and the two of you move towards the threat together. Change a detail or two, and it might be stand ready, try to contain the shooter to a limited area and wait for SWAT. The simple hell is that there's no easy, do it this way and everything will end right approach in the real world.

One thing that can really help -- and that civilians can and should do! -- is to call it in, then stay on the line as long as you can, answering the dispatcher's questions. Staying calm is tough, but they're trained to help calm you down, and the more information we can get before and as we get there, the better. Tactics may change significantly based on what seems like a small detail... At a minimum, you might save us trying to go in a door that's been barricaded!

A note -- they assembled and covered a 1/4 mile in about 5 minutes. That's actually moving pretty quick, all told (when did the last officer arrive?). I'm not going sit here and second guess parking spots or tactics. There is no perfect answer as the situation is developing. It's a little like sparring; when you think about the match later, you can always see the signs and figure a better way to fight your opponent. Lots harder to do when he's in front of you and actively trying to punch you!

 

[Tgace]

I will QB a little bit....a quarter mile away is pretty far. Good for a CP location but not deployment IMO. But that's for AAR purposes...not damnation.

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[jks9199]

I will QB a little bit....a quarter mile away is pretty far. Good for a CP location but not deployment IMO. But that's for AAR purposes...not damnation.

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I don't disagree; I just don't know the layout. The may have parked that far away because it was the only reasonable place to stop. Buses may have been blocking the entrances, things like that which I just don't know. It's not that unreasonable, either...

 

[ballen0351]

We teach active shooter every year for in service. The smallest unit we allow to enter a building is 3. That's not to say of i showed up and saw an opportunity to end it quickly alone I wouldn't try but if I can't see him or don't know exactly where he is at that very moment I'm waiting. 5 min is pretty quick in my opinion. From 1st officer arrived which I assume they used his time he called on scene (I normally call on scene a little before I get on scene so the dispatcher isn't answering me when I pull up and someone starts shooting. So about 30 sec out I'll call arrived they respond ok and I have clear air to yell for help should I need it). So 5 min from arrival of one officer who had to Wait for back up and then get a plan and go in.

 

[Tgace]

We are starting to work with single and 2 man entry options. If you are by yourself and backup is still minutes away its costing lives to wait.

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[ballen0351]

We are starting to work with single and 2 man entry options. If you are by yourself and backup is still minutes away its costing lives to wait.

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We have such a small jurisdiction and so many cops its rare that you wait more then 45 sec to a min before 4 or 5 officers are showing up. That doesn't even count the 6 other police agencies in my city that would all come.

 

[ballen0351]

Oh and I forgot NCIS and FBI hhave offices here too so that's 8 agencies with jurisdiction in 7 square miles.
If you count DOD police that's 9

 

[jks9199]

Oh and I forgot NCIS and FBI hhave offices here too so that's 8 agencies with jurisdiction in 7 square miles.
If you count DOD police that's 9

And -- if you look at what happened at the Navy Yard in September, you see how much chaos multiple agencies on scene end up causing, too. Lots of things went right and went well, but we're learning more and more about what didn't. And I'm not going by anything more than the press coverage...

 

[ballen0351]

And -- if you look at what happened at the Navy Yard in September, you see how much chaos multiple agencies on scene end up causing, too. Lots of things went right and went well, but we're learning more and more about what didn't. And I'm not going by anything more than the press coverage...

Yeah we cross train active shooter with other agencies all the time. In an attempt to prevent that.

 

[punisher73]

My last assignment was a school liaison/resource officer. As such, I went to yearly training hosted by the Dept. Homeland Security and they brought in lots of tops speakers/companies on Active Shooter training. One thing, I noticed is that each year it "changed". There is NO set plan on how to deal with an active shooter and it evolves as the shooters evolve.

For example; when I first took over, schools were encouraged to have a "lockdown" drill. Now, schools usually have two seperate drills; one for the threat inside the building and a second one for an incident outside the building (for example, barricaded gunman close to a school) where you want to control movement and protect inside the school. Next, came the "green/red" cards that teachers were supposed to put under the door to let responding officers know that everything was ok in the room or not. These went by the wayside when responding officers realized that they are going to the sound of the shots and not looking under doors. The latest is starting to train teachers and staff to fight back if the person is trying to breach the door instead of just sheltering in place.

One thing that LE has realized is that in almost all situations, the shooters do NOT have an exit strategy. They don't make a plan on how to get out of there. They either kill themselves when police start to enter the building or die due to the police directly. So, most plans are encouraging officers to enter as quickly and safely as possible with the officers that you have there on scene, which may mean a team of 2-3 officers to get in there as quickly as possible to put pressure on the shooter.

The biggest problem with this type of situation, is that the only way to learn it and get better is to modify plans after an incident has occurred. Which means that unfortunately an incident has occurred. The other thing is that the active shooters are also learning from previous incidents and changing how they do things. For example, prior to Columbine the accepted plan was to set up a perimeter and wait for SWAT to show up to go in an take care of the situation. We all saw the limitations of that. We then get to Virginia Tech and see that the shooter realized police would be entering in right away and took steps to chain the doors closed so they couldn't get in right away.

Because these situations are SO dynamic and high profile, they will always be scrutinzed through hindsight in an attempt to find "the perfect plan".

 

[Rich Parsons]

This is something that certainly is no stranger to LE, as many of these incidents have happened all over. The front page of my newspaper, is talking about the Sandy Hook school shootings that took place last year, in Newtown, Ct.

While not much has been said about it yet, although I predict it will happen sooner or later, is the time that it took for the police to enter the building. According to the paper, the first officer arrived at the school at 9:39am. He parked approx. a quarter mile away from the school, and as other officers approached, they made their way on foot, to the school. They entered the school at 9:44am.

I've read that the Police Chief and Union reps, are defending the officers actions, in the face of some questioning why it took the officers so long to enter.

So my question for the LEOs on the forum: What is your protocol for active shooting situations? Do you enter right away, wait for back up, etc?

It would seem to me that while on the surface, you'd want to get someone inside the building as soon as possible to hopefully put an end to the situation, that waiting for backup to arrive, would be the best thing. Not knowing what you're walking into is certainly a dangerous situation. I'd think that having at least 1 other officer with you, would be better than going in alone.

Mike,

Not a LEO, yet my comments will follow.

Personally, I think the police taking 4 minutes to go a quarter of a mile under possible threat of firearms attacks is good. It means those in my mind, that responded first, wanted to help. They wanted to get involved and they also wanted to go home at the end of the day. The Officer that cares and wants to be there and also wants to go home is the one who will make the better decision for all those involved.

I do not have the data, but based upon what you presented, I see nothing wrong with this.

(* How the press jumped and made mistakes and false reports about what guns were involved is a different story. The Officer in charge of media relations may have something to worry about in my mind, yet I do not have the data nor his rules of engagement. *)