Multiple agencies participate in active shooter drill

It’s the event no parent, teacher, community member, or first responder wants to think could happen here. An active shooter finding their way into a school. But it’s an event that happens all too often, though thankfully has not happened here. And just because it hasn’t happened doesn’t mean that the local law enforcement agencies, first responders, and Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District (MSBSD) are not prepared and continue to prepare for such an event. On October 11, multiple agencies in the Mat-Su Borough came together to participate in a training exercise focused on an active shooter in a high school.

Coordinated by Wasilla Police Department Chief William Rapson, first responders from WPD, Palmer Police Department, Alaska State Troopers, Central Mat-Su Fire, West Lakes Fire, MSBSD, the Red Cross, and the Mobile Crisis Unit, to name a few, all joined in to test their individual responses and responses

Chief Rapson said that while the units typically train individually, it was important to have an exercise where the individual components come together to coalesce in case the worst were to happen.

”We all work isolated, and why we’re doing this was to get everybody involved and see how things would work together when a scale like this would happen,” he explained.

Since joining the WPD in 2006, Chief Rapson said he could not recall the last time a large, multi-agency event took place, and now as Chief, he had a vision for this and began planning about a year ago, with things really getting into motion in April as he looked at their policies, including a mutual aid agreement with the other police agencies, EMS, local hospital, the school district, and even agencies such as the Red Cross and the Mobile Crisis Unit.

“Over the course of the years, we all train individually as police, EMS, and the school district…We’re doing this today to get everybody involved and see how things would work together when a scale (event) like this would happen,” Chief Rapson said before the drill commenced. “We never incorporated how that going to work when we have all these different entities who may train differently.”

While the details of the scenario weren’t readily available, it did not take long to watch and listen from the first screams of the overhead alarm issuing a security alert, to the panicked faces as students and staff evacuated the building, exhibiting the kind of confusion that is to be expected in such a real-world event, to the deployment of police and first responders. The drill even involved scared parents trying to get into the building to find their children.

“We have a lot of volunteers. We couldn’t make it happen without the volunteers. And we tried to simulate a very real event over the things we’ve learned over the years and make it as realistic as possible, because these situations will be very chaotic, there will be a lot of moving parts.”

A reunification center scenario was also set up across the street allowing MSBSD staff, Red Cross volunteers and units from the Mobile Crisis Team to be on hand to provide support and comfort.

On hand for the drill were a dozen evaluators and controllers, as well as observers from the Mat-Su Borough, all making notes of how the scenario played out, and-as is to be expected with any training evolution-what went well and what needs to be worked on in the future. All things Chief Rapson said he expected from such an event.

“I believe that some things are going to go extremely well, and I believe that some things are going to need improvement, and that’s what I’m concentrating on. How can we zero in on our training, how can we identify our deficiencies, and how can we do better?”

The police chief said that there will be a lot of learning how the different agencies work. “Law enforcement’s going to learn what EMS is going to do, going to learn what the school district is going to do, and vice versa. The hospitals, the school district, all these other entities that we have to work with are going to understand the law enforcement aspect. And the community’s going to realize what’s going to be expected, how are we going to respond, and that’s what I’m looking to get out of it. It’s a training exercise.”

He also noted that he expects there will be things that need to be worked on and what areas can be improved. “How we can improve our response, the resources, and to better serve the community when these types of situations happen.”

The active-shooter drill was meant to be as close to real-world as possible, meaning the drill took place inside Iditarod Elementary, which for the sake of the drill was a high school. Volunteers stepped in to be staff, student victims, parents, and even the shooters. Chief Rapson said it was getting the right players involved to make it as real as possible for everyone involved. But he also noted that an active shooter incident could happen anywhere at any time, and while the intent of this particular drill was to test responses at a school, much of the information will be applied to those situations. “It could be any school. It could be any retail store. It could be anywhere.”

Chief Rapson hopes that the community sees that all agencies involved are prepared and are constantly working to improve their responses, and feels confident that if the worst were to happen, that everyone is doing what needs to be done quickly and efficiently to minimize losses. “We’re prepared. We’re working to get prepared, so when, or if it does happen, that we have a response that we’re happy with, that the community’s happy with, given that it’s going to be a tragic event regardless.”