Only a drill: TU tests emergency response plan
By Jill Gosche, jgosche@advertiser-tribune.comArticle Photos
Tiffin rescue personnel responded to a shooting and hostage situation on Tiffin University's campus Wednesday morning.
It all was part of a mock scenario that allowed students to gain experience in dealing with an emergency situation and enabled rescue crews to practice their responses.
Tiffin Police Chief Dave LaGrange said officers have been trained for situations such as those practiced in Wednesday's drill, and it offers them a refresher on their training. TU had the scenario as a training exercise for its students, he said.
"Our role is to try to make it as realistic as possible for them," he said. "It's good training for my people, too, and the fire department."
According to information from TU, the university has been working with Gov. Ted Strickland's campus safety and security task force and the Ohio Board of Regents. Officials have been revising and updating the university's safety plan, which outlines what people should do in situations such as a bomb threat, fire, fire alarm, injury, severe weather and train accident or derailment.
The university is to have another drill Nov. 6 dealing with a train accident.
In situations involving an active shooter, the plan instructs people to call Tiffin police, turn off lights in the room, barricade and lock the doors, remain calm and be quiet. They should try not to do anything that would cause panic, gain unwanted attention or disrupt police, and they should not run yelling or screaming from the building, according to the plan.
The purpose of Wednesday's mock drill was to test part of the plan.
Tim Shaw, assistant professor of criminal justice, said the majority of students in the emergency operations and management course are homeland security majors. They learn how to prepare emergency operations for all hazards, and they came up with Wednesday's scenario, which was TU's first-ever active shooter drill, he said.
It wasn't a fun-and-games approach, he said.
"The university's all about student safety," he said.
The drill was delayed by about 45 minutes as police responded to an actual robbery at National City Bank. Once it started around 10:15 a.m., people wearing T-shirts with red splatters positioned themselves throughout Main Classroom Building, laying on the steps, in the doorway and in the commons area.
At the beginning of the drill, the shooter grabbed a man around his neck.
"He's going upstairs," someone shouted.
Police stormed the building. About 15 minutes after the drill started, Tiffin Fire and Rescue personnel arrived in Main Classroom Building and took inventory of the deceased and injured.
"There's more (victims) upstairs," one person told them.
Shaw said the drill featured a two-man shooting team. One shot people in Main Classroom Building, while the other took people hostage in a restroom in Craycraft Hall.
"One had the guts to carry it out," he said.
Shaw, in his second year at TU, said he spent 21 years in the FBI and has the ability to bring real-life training with him. Four undergraduate students who graduated from TU last year are analysts with the FBI, he said.
Paul D'Amore, a junior from Brook Park studying law enforcement and homeland security, acted as the shooter during the exercise. He wore gloves, a hat, paintball mask, ski mask, sweatpants, a sweatshirt and tennis shoes. He also carried a toy gun capable of shooting plastic pellets.
D'Amore said Shaw asked him whether he'd be interested in taking an active role in the shooter demonstration.
"I jumped all over the chance," he said. "I just thought it would be fun. It's not often you get to go through training like that."
D'Amore, whose career goal is to work with a SWAT team, said he thinks he will benefit from Wednesday's exercise when he is in an academy because he already will know some of the things about which he'll be learning. He said he'll be able to draw on what he did during TU's drill.
"I've been excited all day," he said prior to the drill.
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