Report: Calm Response, Training Were Key to Preventing Additional Carnage in San Bernardino Shooting

Recordings of the emergency radio calls suggest the keys to limiting the carnage from last week’s San Bernardino (CA) mass shooting were training, fast action, good decisions, teamwork, and the eerily calm and deliberate help of dispatchers, firefighters, and helicopter crews, a report says.

The Press Enterprise
offered a few samples of radio traffic from that terrible day, some of which are listed below:

“We’re monitoring PD’s (radio) traffic,” a San Bernardino fire engine captain announced. “Go ahead and put Engine 4 on that call.”

Moments later, he explained his decision to act without specific orders.

“We’re trying to get hold of the chief,” he radioed. “We put ourselves on this call due to the number of people that are down.”

A sheriff’s dispatcher spread the word.

“San Bernardino has an active shooter,” she told deputies throughout the San Bernardino Valley. “They’re asking for all units that are available. 1365 South Waterman. 1365 South Waterman. Several victims down. We don’t have much further” information.

Last Wednesday, Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, a county restaurant inspector, and Tashfeen Malik, 27, massacred 14 people and seriously wounded more than a dozen others in an assault on a social service center for the disabled. They were later gunned down in a shootout with police.

Read more and listen to recordings HERE

RELATED

Terrorism Planning and Response for Mid- and Small-Size Public Safety Agencies

Active -Shooter Incidents: Planning Your Response-full

Fire/EMS at Active -Shooter Incidents

Two New Training Programs on Active Shooter Response

Responding to Active Shooter Incidents

Mass -Shooting Incidents: Planning and Response

Free Firefighter Training: Response to Mass Shooting Events

FIRE DEPARTMENT RESPONSE TO “ACTIVE SHOOTER ” INCIDENTS

Hand entrapped in rope gripper

Elevator Rescue: Rope Gripper Entrapment

Mike Dragonetti discusses operating safely while around a Rope Gripper and two methods of mitigating an entrapment situation.
Delta explosion

Two Workers Killed, Another Injured in Explosion at Atlanta Delta Air Lines Facility

Two workers were killed and another seriously injured in an explosion Tuesday at a Delta Air Lines maintenance facility near the Atlanta airport.