LUFKIN, Texas — About 200 Lufkin police officers, firefighters and other first responders trained last week to speed up response times for in an active shooter situation.
The course, named Active Attack Integrated Response (AAIR), follows Lufkin's new public safety model.
“Each individual group does an excellent job on their own, but because of the change in the way these attacks are carried out, we have to do a better job of integrating those resources,“ Lufkin Director of Public Safety Gerald Williamson said. “It’s all about speed of response – Speed of getting to the victims; speed of stopping the attacker – all of those things are our focus now.”
The sessions were meant to prepare officers for live fire scenarios. The training is based on news events like the Virginia Tech and Pulse Night Club shootings.
One of the important aspects to the training was providing quick first aid to possible victims. One of the risks is allowing paramedics to enter a scene before it is fully secured to minimize the blood loss of potential victims.
“Normally we stage and wait for the scene to be secured before making entry so this is a totally different mindset than what we’re used to - making entry almost upon arrival,” Lufkin Fire Chief Ted Lovett explained. “We know how to neutralize ‘fire’ – that’s what we do, but our ‘fire’ doesn’t shoot back.”
Police officers also learning emergency medicine to assist victims before fire units and paramedics arrive on the scene.
“Police officers are learning emergency medicine to do on scene before the fire department gets there,” Lufkin Police Chief David Thomas said. “We all learned something new.”
