Author: Jennifer Nakayama

FM Issue: January/February 2017

Who can turn on the television today and not see a horrific story of an active shooter, bomb threat, or fire catastrophe on the news? Does it actually surprise anyone to see one of these scrolling headlines? Sadly, no. The reality is, one or more of these scenarios will face each one of us within our lifetime, either directly or by association, and have become the unfortunate given in our lives.

And as venue managers, we need to prepare, prepare, and prepare some more. We all say we commit to running emergency scenario drills for our staff and tenants, but how truly meaningful are they? In order to see if your drills are reaching the objective of a solid learning experience, here are four questions to ask yourself:

If you randomly stopped one of your front-line employees, what would they say if you asked them:

1. Can you name four or more possible exit routes from where you are standing?
2. What makes a backpack a suspicious package?
3. What is your first reaction when you hear real gunshots?
4. Would YOU be able to answer any of the three questions above any better?

Textbook lessons and handouts to your safety committee are one layer of emergency drill training, and many of you even go beyond that to in-person training with presentations and videos. But have you thought about taking it one step further to a truly “active” training session? Not only will you engage the interest of your staff for longer than the nanosecond that it takes to nod off in traditional safety training, but the information itself will stick with them longer because they have actually experienced something and are not just going through the motions. You helped them make a memory that will last longer than any paper lesson plan.

Here are some tips for bringing active content to a few emergency scenarios:

Active Shooter

• Reach out to local law enforcement, specifically your police department or SWAT or rapid deployment services. They may be willing to run their own training exercise side-by-side with yours, so it is a win-win for both of you – you get to plan how your operations will work in conjunction with them and they get tangible training within your building layout.
• Allow the local law enforcement to play the role of the active shooter or shooters with blank rounds discharged throughout the drill.
• If local law enforcement is not able to be present, bring in examples of responding officer gear and attire, and teach their identifying markings and badge identification.
• Coordinate to have multiple shooters in the scenario, in different simultaneous areas/levels of the building. 
• Pre-plan the route that the shooters will take, through both FOH and BOH (staff offices are very important as well).
• If staff chose to RUN — have them stand up and practice how to physically exit the space they are in – calm and quiet and arms in the air and fingers spread.
• If staff chose to HIDE – have them go into their chosen hiding place and have fellow employees critique if they can be seen or heard or detected.
• If staff chose to FIGHT – have them impromptu select an object and explain how they would use it in a defense (inflict harm, generate avoidance, create distraction).
• Notify your neighboring buildings, facilities, and neighbors in advance, in case any aspects of the drill are presumed to be real by an outsider that is not participating.

Bomb Threat

• Hire actors or seek out volunteer thespians to play the role of the bomber that places a call to your reception desk or staff member.
• Reach out to local first responders, especially SWAT and canine deployment forces. They may be willing to run their own training exercise side-by-side with yours, so it is a win-win for both of you – you get to plan how your operations will work in conjunction with them and they get tangible training within your building layout.
• If local law enforcement is not able to be present, bring in examples of responding officer gear and attire, and teach their identifying markings and badge identification.
• Notify your neighboring buildings, facilities, and neighbors in advance, in case any aspects of the drill are presumed to be real by an outsider that is not participating.
• When placing the fake device(s) to be found during the drill, remember that both FOH and BOH can be realistic targets. The device can be concealed inside a suspicious package to make difficult detection more realistic.
• Coordinate to have multiple bomb devices in the scenario, in different and simultaneous areas/levels of the building. 
• Have examples to show of possible bomb containment devices – common objects like boxes, backpacks, pressure cookers, suitcases – and teach what does versus does not make such objects suspicious.
• Encourage staff to not utilize cell phones, remotes, or other electronic frequency devices during this drill, but devise direct communication exercises that must take place. Therefore, other alternative means will have to be improvised, created and used by staff.

Fire Catastrophe

• Hire a certified safety training company to simulate a fire and have staff learn to physically hold a fire extinguisher and go through the PASS teaching lesson, discharging the actual extinguisher contents.
• Reach out to local first responders, especially fire department and EMTs. They may be willing to run their own training exercise side-by-side with yours, so it is a win-win for both of you – you get to plan how your operations will work in conjunction with them and they get tangible training within your building layout.
• If local law enforcement is not able to be present, bring in examples of responding entities’ gear and attire, and teach their identifying markings and badge identification.
• When choosing a place to simulate a fire stating in the building, remember that both FOH and BOH can be realistic targets.
• Coordinate to have multiple fire locations in the scenario, in different or spreading areas/levels of the building. 
• Notify your neighboring buildings, facilities, and neighbors in advance, in case any aspects of the drill are presumed to be real by an outsider that is not participating.
• Simulate shutting down elevators as possible evacuation routes to emphasize the use and knowledge of emergency egress staircases, as well as where they exit the building.
• Along with the evacuation drill, take the opportunity to fully test your fire alarm devices, strobes, audibles, and PA announcements.

So, take the New Year’s resolution for your job and now’s the time to schedule your emergency scenario drills for 2017. Make sure that you include some very active activities for your staff to take part in and it is guaranteed to make your training more memorable to everyone. And that is what will save lives … not the training itself per se, but how quickly and effectively your staff can recall the needed information in the recesses of their brain. Active learning applied to running an active emergency drill will increase your staff’s reaction times and take your facility preparedness to a whole new level.

Jennifer Nakayama is director of operations at the Hawai‘i Convention Center/SMG in Honolulu.