I got to be an active shooter today

My wife volunteered me to play an active shooter for a drill at the hospital. It was interesting. It was scripted as a domestic situation which overflowed into the hospital with the victim being a hospital employee. Everyone was aware there was going to be a drill including the patients. But no one besides the planners and the police were privy to how it would happen. We got together and stepped through it before kicking it off.

What I found exceptionally interesting was the concern of the police that it could go sideways due to an unaware concealed carrier thinking it was the real deal and shooting me. Mind you, carrying into a hospital here is illegal but the cops said that no one actually pays attention to that law and it is stupid to believe that anyone would abide by it, especially someone intent on doing harm. So the cops were on hand to make sure I didn't get shot by some well intentioned person. 

The target of my shooting was the head of radiology who is a smoke show, 10 out 10. I told her it was nothing personal and also shot the person who works in the office with her. Kind of funny, after the shooting, one of the workers in the radiology department came into the office and locked the door behind her. I asked what she was doing and she said she was hiding from the shooter. Bad luck on her part, she got added to the body count. Then I left the office and found maintenance cleaning an exam room. One more dead. Then it was my turn to off myself.

It was interesting doing the AAR. The receptionist who I asked where radiology was said I scared the crap out of her. I was masked and had sunglasses on, otherwise she would have recognized me from my delivering flowers on a regular basis. But she also said I was very polite because I said thanks after she wouldn't tell me where to go and that I would find it myself. I apologized to her and said I would bring her a flower sometime.

Observations on my part. If they really got hit with someone who wanted to kill lots of people, it would be a bloodbath. With the possible exception of the legal concealed carrier carrying into a prohibited place. It took 3 minutes after I announced my intentions to commit murder for the hospital to go into lockdown. They can lock most of the internal and external doors on command from the security team but they have to wait to get an alert from an employee. I had 4 people dead before that happened and except it wasn't scripted that way I could have done a whole lot more. It took 11 minutes for the text messages to go out that there was a shooter in the building which was coincidentally right about the time the cops found me. 

It was a good experience, I hope to get to participate again but they let me off the leash so I can really show them how bad it could be.

My biggest concern, at least before the cops mentioned the possibility of getting shot by someone not in the drill, was that I would give one of the little old ladies who volunteer at the front desk a heart attack. Thankfully that didn't happen.

I have done that dozens of times and never in public. We used Sims and shot at the incoming officers.

Lots of great training when using Sims and engaging in live fire. Really gets your head on straight.

It took one jackass employee to ruin it all and now none of us can be role players. One guy could not stay on script and they won’t ask us back.

I have done that dozens of times and never in public. We used Sims and shot at the incoming officers.

Lots of great training when using Sims and engaging in live fire. Really gets your head on straight.

It took one jackass employee to ruin it all and now none of us can be role players.  One guy could not stay on script and they  won’t ask us back.

that really stinks, ya need to waterboard the fool, video it & show them the video so they will invite you back 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

My wife volunteered me to play an active shooter for a drill at the hospital. It was interesting. It was scripted as a domestic situation which overflowed into the hospital with the victim being a hospital employee. Everyone was aware there was going to be a drill including the patients. But no one besides the planners and the police were privy to how it would happen. We got together and stepped through it before kicking it off.

What I found exceptionally interesting was the concern of the police that it could go sideways due to an unaware concealed carrier thinking it was the real deal and shooting me. Mind you, carrying into a hospital here is illegal but the cops said that no one actually pays attention to that law and it is stupid to believe that anyone would abide by it, especially someone intent on doing harm. So the cops were on hand to make sure I didn't get shot by some well intentioned person. 

The target of my shooting was the head of radiology who is a smoke show, 10 out 10. I told her it was nothing personal and also shot the person who works in the office with her. Kind of funny, after the shooting, one of the workers in the radiology department came into the office and locked the door behind her. I asked what she was doing and she said she was hiding from the shooter. Bad luck on her part, she got added to the body count. Then I left the office and found maintenance cleaning an exam room. One more dead. Then it was my turn to off myself.

It was interesting doing the AAR. The receptionist who I asked where radiology was said I scared the crap out of her. I was masked and had sunglasses on, otherwise she would have recognized me from my delivering flowers on a regular basis. But she also said I was very polite because I said thanks after she wouldn't tell me where to go and that I would find it myself. I apologized to her and said I would bring her a flower sometime.

Observations on my part. If they really got hit with someone who wanted to kill lots of people, it would be a bloodbath. With the possible exception of the legal concealed carrier carrying into a prohibited place. It took 3 minutes after I announced my intentions to commit murder for the hospital to go into lockdown. They can lock most of the internal and external doors on command from the security team but they have to wait to get an alert from an employee. I had 4 people dead before that happened and except it wasn't scripted that way I could have done a whole lot more. It took 11 minutes for the text messages to go out that there was a shooter in the building which was coincidentally right about the time the cops found me. 

It was a good experience, I hope to get to participate again but they let me off the leash so I can really show them how bad it could be.

My biggest concern, at least before the cops mentioned the possibility of getting shot by someone not in the drill, was that I would give one of the little old ladies who volunteer at the front desk a heart attack. Thankfully that didn't happen.

When the wife got in a crash and ended up in the ER the metal detector went crazy on me, thankfully I had my retired credentials & got in 

I’ve always got a 442 (working on the 642) in a pocket when out of the house & have yet to get caught, even went through a metal detector at a convention center with it & nobody knew 😱😱😳😳🤣🤣🤣🤣

I have done that dozens of times and never in public. We used Sims and shot at the incoming officers.

Lots of great training when using Sims and engaging in live fire. Really gets your head on straight.

It took one jackass employee to ruin it all and now none of us can be role players.  One guy could not stay on script and they  won’t ask us back.

Seems to me that would make the training more realistic. A real shooter is not going to be following the cops script.

Terry

I have done that dozens of times and never in public. We used Sims and shot at the incoming officers.

Lots of great training when using Sims and engaging in live fire. Really gets your head on straight.

It took one jackass employee to ruin it all and now none of us can be role players.  One guy could not stay on script and they  won’t ask us back.

Seems to me that would make the training more realistic. A real shooter is not going to be following the cops script.

Terry

Yeah, kinda sounds like someone got mad because they got spanked by a wildcard. Of course there's no way to know if the jackass wasn't doing things that would have been unsafe.

My biggest concern, at least before the cops mentioned the possibility of getting shot by someone not in the drill, was that I would give one of the little old ladies who volunteer at the front desk a heart attack. Thankfully that didn't happen.

I’m not sure I have the guts to participate under those circumstances. The idea that someone who doesn’t know it’s a drill plugging the pretend active shooter…

I have done that dozens of times and never in public. We used Sims and shot at the incoming officers.

Lots of great training when using Sims and engaging in live fire. Really gets your head on straight.

It took one jackass employee to ruin it all and now none of us can be role players.  One guy could not stay on script and they  won’t ask us back.

Seems to me that would make the training more realistic. A real shooter is not going to be following the cops script.

Terry

Off script by trying to control the scenario and making changes mid way through. When you are told to engage from the rear then lay down and die once hit and decide not to go down and run into a room we are not using......or hamming it up to make the officers laugh.....or farting when the officer cuffs you.....or just trying to get all the attention when you are there to perform a role, the organizers get a tad pissed off. I actually would not go to any trainings this knucklehead was going to be at as he was embarrassing to be around. 

We had latitude, we also had to follow rules. It was fun while it lasted.

I have done that dozens of times and never in public. We used Sims and shot at the incoming officers.

Lots of great training when using Sims and engaging in live fire. Really gets your head on straight.

It took one jackass employee to ruin it all and now none of us can be role players.  One guy could not stay on script and they  won’t ask us back.

Seems to me that would make the training more realistic. A real shooter is not going to be following the cops script.

Terry

Off script by trying to control the scenario and making changes mid way through. When you are told to engage from the rear then lay down and die once hit and decide not to go down and run into a room we are not using......or hamming it up to make the officers laugh.....or farting when the officer cuffs you.....or just trying to get all the attention when you are there to perform a role, the organizers get a tad pissed off. I actually would not go to any trainings this knucklehead was going to be at as he was embarrassing to be around. 

We had latitude, we also had to follow rules. It was fun while it lasted.

Ah, the immature class clown. That explains it. Not a place to be acting childish.

Working in hospital security taught me a lot about hospitals and just furthered my desire to avoid the places at all costs (unless I'm paid to be there.) Hospitals are dangerous places, even the smaller hospital I'm at now gets a few violent patients each week (nothing in comparison to the legit ghetto-sited facility I used to work at where many shifts were nothing but fights and reports) - and outside the ER nurses and those working the psych units - most hospital employees aren't mentally geared to deal with violence. They have no idea what to do in any sort of emergency beyond a Code Blue, and even when we had legit fires (small ones) no one took fire alarms seriously. Most hospital employees aren't willing to jump into a fight either - they looooove to stand back and watch violence happen - but only a special few are willing to get in and lend a hand, even if one of their own is being assaulted.

The hospitals in the chain I work for take security as a joke for the most part - a necessary evil to satisfy Joint Commission requirements and insurance requirements. Each hospital has its own CEO, but they're all owned by the same company. Out of all the hospitals I know of in that chain in Texas, *one* has armed officers. The hospital I began my career in the field at at least has at least a couple taser toters on shift (I was one before leaving that site) - the hospital I currently work at (very part time now since I'm working regularly for my son's school providing security, and pursuing a college degree) has *no* taser officers, unless the site supervisor (assistant director, this site has a hospital employee as director of security) is on duty, only he is authorized to carry a taser at this facility.

Its illegal for anyone other than law enforcement officers or a security person employed by the facility to carry a firearm into a hospital in Texas, but this is still Texas, and we don't have metal detectors at the entrances. Most people, even LTC (CHL for those not from Texas) holders have no idea where they can and cannot legally carry. When we passed permitless carry, that just means more people carrying guns and not knowing where prohibited places are, or ignoring the signs (not that I am against ignoring signs, frankly I think there should be *no* prohibited places - and only prohibited persons would be those so dangerous they should be locked away from society) -- I'd bet at any given time in the hospitals I've worked at, at least half a dozen or more people are armed excluding the cops bringing people into the ER, or the occasionall officer picking up an extra duty shift babysitting the ER waiting room.

At the hospital I work at now we'd be f0000000000ked if there were an active shooter, because there's typically only two security personnel on duty, and only get an off duty cop working the ER on weekends. Even though local PD has a response time around 3-5 minutes for a 9-1-1 call, that's a lot of dead people potentially. Almost every one of my coworkers also admitted to me if someone started shooting, they are running away as fast as they can - to hell with the patients and staff (at least they're honest.) I'm the only one, other than one supervisor at my old site, who wears armor even though we were unarmed. Company won't issue armor, though they approve concealable armor if provided by the officer.

Training is pathetic for the most part. Only motivated individuals who seek exterior training are worth a damn. Supervisors kept hiring senior citizens, small statured females, or lazy ass hood rats - maybe they're the only ones willing to work the place unarmed, or for the wages offered, or could be some racial / gender bias going on (I know for the later yes, because a certain supervisor doing the hiring is a foookin' horn dog who kept hiring pretty little ladies then running them off when they didn't like being creeped on) -- we are hands on with combative / resistive people, but they kept hiring people with no ability to fight, or no WILL to fight. I dunno how many times during a fight with particularly strong and violent patients I've had to yell and give step by step directions to my partner, while trying to give commands to the individual we were attempting to restrain or control.

Other hospitals here are probably better - at least all the others employ armed officers, which means they have 5X the required classroom training (still not much...) - and those working armed tend to be a little better in general than those working unarmed by choice. In house teams tend to get better training, better pay, and better people than contract security does. If I stay in private security after finishing my degree, it will be because I'm moving to an in-house position with a hospital, or maybe in-house with an educational institution or school district. As much as I poo poo'd above - its a damn fun job, and when I had good partners on shift, things typically went well. A friend of mine just hired on with a hospital in Dallas, in-house, they provide his armor, his gun, his duty gear, uniforms, and the bastard even gets a free meal every shift. We dont' even get a discount (not that the cafeteria stays open for night shifters anyway, the hosptial hates all overnighters I guess.)

Security needs waaaaaaaaaaaay more training than they get, and especially anyone working a sensitive place like a school or hospital should have 10X the training we get or are mandated right now. Active shooter should be done twice a year for these places, as should medical emergency drills. You'd think a hospital would have fast response times for medical emergencies, but you'd be wrong. I've waited ten minutes to get medical teams to respond to a guy having a seizure in a lobby, and five plus minutes to get "rapid response" for a patient who fell down and struck her head on the sidewalk a hundred yards from the ER entrance.

I'm glad your wife's hospital is doing training like this. After the murder of the security officer in Portland last summer, I hoped our facility would 1.) get more training and 2.) reconsider making us armed but neither happened. People are expendable. If it doesn't make for better CMS and JC scores they won't do sheet.