[GPalmer]

Warbow, your response captivate me, please feel free to use my inbox

 

[walkinguf61]

Let’s just say, sure, CQB drill was obviously a part of this, but I’m not going to get deeper into the NFDD thing with you. There’s a lot you might not know that isn’t appropriate to discuss here.

Let’s stick to tactics that don’t require a SWAT team either like flash bangs.
The general consensus with active school shooters is now that we generally don’t have time for such teams to form up.
And as you rightfully have done, not to discuss fancier tactics on a public forum that a killer can counter.
SWAT has all sorts of “ breecher” tactics that were commonly used in Iraq. A lock on a door isn’t much of an issue if they have time to set up.

 

[SAR]

You know it does occur to me. Just reading this thread, seeing how there are various agencies and experience levels, and seeing how we can’t come to a complete agreement over the tactics employed, just proves the point how difficult it is to manage a chaotic active shooting scene. We’re using the benefit of hindsight in a relatively safe environment here in Glocktalk. Yet, two days later, we’re still hashing out the issues…. This right here just shows me how difficult it is to make these kinds of split second decisions and although the prevailing sentiment is that the Chief made a monumental tactical error, I feel for him and can see how agonizing his decision must have been. I mean we’re not lay people. We’re people with real world experience, and here we are trying to make sense of this situation WITH the benefit of hindsight and still can’t totally agree.

 

[walkinguf61]

No, I’m not. I’m stating a piece of common knowledge. None of the kids are in the room doing jumping jacks. I’m stating what’s been stated over the multiple pages: that this was a CF of epic proportions and after 23yrs of training and table topping on this subject it’s still a goat ****. I’ve actually had roles in modern active shooter training for the special people (LE). And I say “special” because apparently no one knows nothin except for LE…

The answer to this situation whether then or now (hindsight) is NOT “do nothing” which is exactly what was done

Thank you

It’s 20/20 hindsight knowing that kids weren’t huddled up by the killer by the door when the initial responding cops didn’t push forward right there and then.
And I am not saying anything about your training or experience. I have no idea of what you do.
An example of what I am talking about was the Pulse nightclub active shooter.

 

[1cm]

This right here just shows me how difficult it is to make these kinds of split second decisions and although the prevailing sentiment is that the Chief made a monumental tactical error, I feel for him and can see how agonizing his decision must have been.

No split second decision needed to be made.

Just follow the process as outlined by every training organization in the country based on decades of experience.

Since kids are either not killed yet or bleeding out and in need of urgent medical care, there is no time to stop the fight.

Thor Eells, executive director of the National Tactical Officers Association (NTAO), said "If you're in a classroom with innocent victims and I know that shots have been fired, I need to engage you. Even if you stopped firing, I'm going to make entry into the room so we can begin to administer life-saving aid to any potential victims," Eells said.

The delayed police response in Uvalde runs contrary to well-established, commonly taught active shooter protocol established after the Columbine school shooting of 1999, Eells said

 

[SAR]

No split second decision needed to be made.

Just follow the process as outlined by every training organization in the country based on decades of experience.

Since kids are either not killed yet or bleeding out and in need of urgent medical care, there is no time to stop the fight.

Thor Eells, executive director of the National Tactical Officers Association (NTAO), said "If you're in a classroom with innocent victims and I know that shots have been fired, I need to engage you. Even if you stopped firing, I'm going to make entry into the room so we can begin to administer life-saving aid to any potential victims," Eells said.

The delayed police response in Uvalde runs contrary to well-established, commonly taught active shooter protocol established after the Columbine school shooting of 1999, Eells said

You make it sound so easy. What’s your experience level?

 

[1cm]

You make it sound so easy. What’s your experience level?

For sake of argument assume I have zero experience.

Now given that, I cannot find a single professional Active Shooter Training school that says they handled it correctly, can you cite one?

You see it is not about me, it is about all your fellow door kickers who said he phucked up.

 

[walkinguf61]

How many carry them? Dunno but I suppose that answer will vary place to place. What realistic danger would a flash bang pose to the kids?

Whether they’re carried by regular guys or supervisors or not at all, or whether they’re trained to use a multi bang device and make entry on top of them is immaterial. It’s probably the best answer for the scenario.

How bout finding solutions instead of “do nothing”. Because once upon a time someone would’ve said “arrive on scene and move to contact?!? That’s ludicrous! What if this, that, etc”. And that’s exactly how it used to be, and how it changed or was supposed to have changed.

Either way, not my problem. But I do know how to handle the problem. It’s a CQB problem.

Regular patrol do not carry flash bangs at all nor trained on them. Heck, SWAT teams are getting flack for having them — remember the calls for the demilitarization of the police.
It’s the SWAT teams that have that stuff hence why they wait for them to come to use such tools and tactics that have the most chance of success.
And clearly, if we want to talk of experiences and how an LE or military experience on a room entry might help you understand the limitations of the flash bang. They have to open the door or window to get it into the room first. Second, a flash bang might give a startled response to pull the trigger on his weapon if his finger is already on it. The third reason I won’t discuss publicly

And there are other methods of dynamic entries we won’t discuss here that SWAT usually has available.

 

[SAR]

For sake of argument assume I have zero experience.

Now given that, I cannot find a single professional Active Shooter Training school that says they handled it correctly, can you cite one?

You see it is not about me, it is about all your fellow door kickers who said he phucked up.

So you’re talking all classroom theory and I’m talking from the perspective of 40 years of actual experience, 27 years of them as a supervisor, and with countless critical incidents under my belt. Nothing ever goes like you read about and if you keep spouting about how professional active shooter training Doctrine is, I’m going to ask you what your experience there is. I taught active shooter training at my agency for years.

 

[walkinguf61]

There’s a lot of options other than what was actually done. Very true that knowing the door etc is useful to know which options are the better ones. The general doors we are speaking of, the locking mechanism can be defeated. Aside from blowing the door (not a likely option at all), defeating the door w/ firearms is an option as we mentioned but moving beyond that, you can manually defeat most of those locks w/ a couple simple hand tools or lock picks, and that can be done quietly. Need noise to cover the manipulations of the door? Sound the fire alarm. If cops had gone in earlier maybe they could have secured keys from the principal or custodial staff. I’m pretty sure the school has a Knox box on it also. I’m not willing to act or accept that a bunch of cops were simply confused by a standard school door.

Yes picking a lock is an option— can you pick a lock? I can’t with most locks. SWAT often have members who can. Heck, some of our ESU guys are elevator repair trained ( hostage in an elevator like in the movie Speed).
Everything you are mentioning are solutions for why SWAT was created.

 

[1cm]

So you’re talking all classroom theory

No I am quoting professional "Been There, Done That Folks"

Tell me where Thor Eells is wrong:

Thor Eells, executive director of the National Tactical Officers Association (NTAO), said "If you're in a classroom with innocent victims and I know that shots have been fired, I need to engage you. Even if you stopped firing, I'm going to make entry into the room so we can begin to administer life-saving aid to any potential victims," Eells said.

Tell me were Director McCraw (20 years FBI/20 years DPS Director) is wrong?

Tell me where Paul Howe (20 years SOCOM) is wrong?

Tell me where Gilliam, Pike, ALERRT, O'Neill, and dozens of other door kickers or trainers are wrong?

Name ONE recognized expert who thinks it was handled correctly. Just One.

 

[Sam Spade]

I've seen a picture of the door, but damn if I can find it again. Concrete block wall, steel frame, exterior hinges, steel fire door. Rectangular window on center line, maybe 3" wide and 9" tall. The cops were neither shooting their way in, nor ramming. Simply not happening without an explosive entry, meaning not happening.

Meanwhile, over at the windows.....

 

[walkinguf61]

For sake of argument assume I have zero experience.

Now given that, I cannot find a single professional Active Shooter Training school that says they handled it correctly, can you cite one?

You see it is not about me, it is about all your fellow door kickers who said he phucked up.

Of course they didn’t. Look at the results. It’s where and why it went wrong. None of these schools have given much other than saying “ go in”. They don’t have all the information yet as to say how yet.
More is coming out why the initial units shooting it out with him couldn’t. The door was locked ( how did they know it was locked if they didn’t try it). The door opens out so they couldn’t kick it in.
Having Botac team wait was a mistake. They are a SWAT team. Not getting a key earlier was a mistake.

 

[1cm]

Having Botac team wait was a mistake.

Almost everybody agrees....still a few holdouts.

 

[1cm]

I've seen a picture of the door, but damn if I can find it again.

I posted it in the other thread. Room had low horizontal windows too.

 

[walkinguf61]

No I am quoting professional "Been There, Done That Folks"

Tell me where Thor Eells is wrong:

Thor Eells, executive director of the National Tactical Officers Association (NTAO), said "If you're in a classroom with innocent victims and I know that shots have been fired, I need to engage you. Even if you stopped firing, I'm going to make entry into the room so we can begin to administer life-saving aid to any potential victims," Eells said.

Tell me were Director McCraw (20 years FBI/20 years DPS Director) is wrong?

Tell me where Paul Howe (20 years SOCOM) is wrong?

Tell me where Gilliam, Pike, ALERRT, O'Neill, and dozens of other door kickers or trainers are wrong?

Name ONE recognized expert who thinks it was handled correctly. Just One.

Yes and the question is how that entry is done.
The school “ chief “ decision not use the border patrol’s SWAT team was wrong. However, it might have been a proper call when and if he didnt have the resources to open the door. And what if a child was placed against that door.
Please note that the Border Patrol team that did go in waited not just because the “school chief” said no. They also waited for the key to the door.

 

[SAR]

No I am quoting professional "Been There, Done That Folks"

Tell me where Thor Eells is wrong:

Thor Eells, executive director of the National Tactical Officers Association (NTAO), said "If you're in a classroom with innocent victims and I know that shots have been fired, I need to engage you. Even if you stopped firing, I'm going to make entry into the room so we can begin to administer life-saving aid to any potential victims," Eells said.

Tell me were Director McCraw (20 years FBI/20 years DPS Director) is wrong?

Tell me where Paul Howe (20 years SOCOM) is wrong?

Tell me where Gilliam, Pike, ALERRT, O'Neill, and dozens of other door kickers or trainers are wrong?

Name ONE recognized expert who thinks it was handled correctly. Just One.

You and I are not on the same page. Honestly, I am not disagreeing with what classrooms teach about how to handle an active shooter incident. I have been on enough critical incidents to know that the Fog of War is real. At that very moment, you don’t know what you know and your decision process may become skewed.

I mean we teach pilots how not to crash by having them fly in a simulator for countless hours so they should never crash right? We teach police officers shoot, don’t shoot scenarios so they should never have a bad shooting right?

I am not arguing classroom theory here. I am talking about how decisions are made under stress and you still can’t tell me about your own experience when you might have had to make a life or death decision.

 

[OLY-M4gery]

No split second decision needed to be made.

Just follow the process as outlined by every training organization in the country based on decades of experience.

Since kids are either not killed yet or bleeding out and in need of urgent medical care, there is no time to stop the fight.

Thor Eells, executive director of the National Tactical Officers Association (NTAO), said "If you're in a classroom with innocent victims and I know that shots have been fired, I need to engage you. Even if you stopped firing, I'm going to make entry into the room so we can begin to administer life-saving aid to any potential victims," Eells said.

The delayed police response in Uvalde runs contrary to well-established, commonly taught active shooter protocol established after the Columbine school shooting of 1999, Eells said

Aren't you the guy that wanted the SWAT team? Waiting for a SWAT team is contrary to "the process".

Everyone knowing, agreeing to, and being trained on "the process", is great.

But actually doing it is much harder.

"Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth." - Mike Tyson

My former department had to change it's use of force policies to allow active shooter protocols. Because active shooter protocols are so much more aggressive then prior tactics allowed.

We had admin staff that believed that shooting a suspect without giving verbal commands, to allow them to surrender was un-Constitutional behavior.

Not to mention, more than a few officers are hesitant, or just don't want to use force, especially deadly force.

----------------

I think it's interesting all the talk about the officers should have gone in regardless of risk.

If that is the employer/public's expectation, all police officers should have life insurance, worker's comp, etc designed around that premise, provided by that same employer/public. Most do not.

I worked for a 500 officer department. One of my co-workers was run over by a suspect, and critically injured. When he wasn't able to return to return to work in 180 days, they tried to force him off worker's comp, and retire him. That would have seriously cut into what he was taking home. It took about a year, for him to return to work. He worked 5 more years. That allowed him to retire with the full benefits.

-----------------

Having or not having shields, "go bags", breaching equipment, available in every patrol car is also an issue. Saying "get in there", which is the right tactic, but not having a way to breach a steel door in a steel frame is an issue.

-----------------

Pulse Nightclub - was an active shooter that was confronted outside, but able to get inside and become a barricaded active shooter.

Columbine High - Shooters confronted by an SRO in the parking lot, but able to get inside and become barricaded active shooters.

Parkland High - Just a disaster.

------------------

Saying you need to go in and confront an active shooter is easy. But actually doing it seems to be much harder.

It looks like a training and leadership issue.

Not to mention a public that seems to bristle at police officer with exterior load bearing vests, pants with cargo pockets, and long guns to name a few things

Then everyone acts surprised when the police officers that are trained to de-escalate, and avoid using force, don't go into battle mode when they encounter an active shooter.

 

[walkinguf61]

I posted it in the other thread. Room had low horizontal windows too. View attachment 1072142

Thank you. That new information changes things. They could see if a hostage was in front of the door or not . They could also shoot thru the glass of the door

 

[1cm]

Aren't you the guy that wanted the SWAT team?

No I asked if any members responded and if so why they did not enter or lead the charge since they should know school layout better than BORTAC.

We really need answers as to what happened in that hallway, I sure as hell hope it does not come down to interagency rivalry or some other bs.