Active shooter situations: six things everyone should know

Just as school shootings have become frighteningly routine in the years since Columbine and Sandy Hook, the horrific mass-murder in Pittsburgh on Saturday, October 27, 2018, removed any doubt that mass casualty shootings are a thing in the United States. When it happened again on Nov. 7 in the quiet suburban community of Thousand Oaks, Calif., the risk now clearly reaches beyond public buildings and large gatherings and into private businesses. As terrible as this may be, we also have learned from recent incidents how people can reduce the risk and improve their safety if someone starts shooting.

Every place where people gather needs to think, plan and practice. Conversations about this are happening in every temple and synagogue this week, as they have also occurred in many churches, mosques and community centers. The conversations need to be ongoing, plans need to be updated on a regular basis, and most importantly, people need to actually practice how to escape or evacuate or use a tourniquet.

Parkland High School students Adam Alhanti and John Barnitt told me recently about a few things they think should be done differently when planning for emergencies. Even though their school had safety drills, teachers and students were scared and some were confused about where to go or what to do. That's normal, but in an active shooter situation, confusion can be deadly. Most importantly, as they hid in closets, students did not know how to distinguish official information from all of the other messages they were getting from social media and text messages from frightened friends and family. Bottom line: active shooter plans -- and all emergency plans -- must include clear modes of communication, established in advance.

Here are a few things that everyone should know:

1. Provide at least basic training so that your community understands "move, escape or attack" (an updated/improved version of "run, hide, fight," as taught in most drills) or "avoid, barricade, confront," as the NYPD teaches. Contact your local police department if you don't already work with a security consultant - relationships are best when they start before any emergency. Some departments offer active shooter training, others can point you to local resources.
2. Teach people how to "stop the bleed." Lives were saved in Pittsburgh, in the recent YouTube incident and in the Las Vegas massacre by people who knew how to correctly improvise tourniquets. Consider purchasing Stop the Bleed Kits - there is a great selection at https://controlbleedingkits.com/. And you can encourage people to attend a short "Stop the Bleed" class.
3. Everyone needs to understand how and where to evacuate. Let people know why they should not have anything in their hands and the importance of checking-in after getting to safety. Preplanning must include multiple ways to escape and assembly points a safe distance away.
4. Designate multiple communications methods. If there is an emergency, how will people get official information? Make sure people know not to pull a fire alarm unless they see smoke or flames and to switch cell phones to silent. How can you get emergency information to people who may have sight, hearing or other limitations or do not understand English? (And let first responders know if you know of people with special needs in your facility during an emergency.)
5. Map your buildings. Share these maps with police, fire and other emergency agencies. Closets, utility rooms, elevators, and nooks and crannies are important when SWAT officers go into an active shooter site. Add those maps to your emergency command kits, along with hazardous materials information sheets likely already there. Also include rosters of people in your organization whenever possible.
6. Practice, practice, practice. Several people escaped in Pittsburgh because they knew what to do and where to go based on drills. The YouTube shooting would have been much worse if employees had not followed emergency procedures that they had practiced multiple times. Practice also helped prepare an employee at a local fast food restaurant when two shooting victims ran in, bleeding. The employee improvised a tourniquet and saved lives.

We are in interesting times, but we can navigate them best if we take steps proactively and work in advance with our law enforcement professionals.

Some resources:

This article is based in part on a presentation by Ron LaPedis at the Bay Area Emergency Management Association Conference in South San Francisco, Calif. in October 2018.

(Updated Nov. 8, 2018 to reflect Thousand Oaks, Calif., mass murder and adding additional active shooter preparedness information from the New York Police Department.)