Fort Leonard Wood's Active Shooter Course has a new home in the Audie Murphy Community Center -- a location that allows primarily military police students to focus training on present-day threats.
Before moving to what is now being referred to as the Audie Murphy Training Club, the Active Shooter Course was at a Military Operations on Urbanized Terrain site, which is set up for urban warfare training.
"I think the Audie Murphy Training Club is a phenomenal training facility. It gets the students out of that deployment mindset and allows them so many more options," said Sgt. 1st Class Richard Dauphin, Active Shooter Committee chief.
Dauphin said the Basic Military Police Training Division has been looking for a location to move the active shooter training to for a while.
"We were looking for a place that would bring military police out of the tactical element and into more of a law-enforcement setting," Dauphin said. "Instead of going into a concrete room out at the MOUT site that is bare of any furniture, they can go into what feels and looks like a real-life scenario. It is easier for the students to grasp that it's not me in my Humvee anymore; it's me in my patrol car."
According to Dauphin, every military police Soldier-in-training will come through the Active Shooter Course during their Advanced Individual Training.
During training, Soldiers use plastic 9mm handguns and an M4 rifle with blank ammunition.
Students pull up outside the training center in a patrol car, and then have to make a safe entrance into the building.
Dauphin said they are making use of all the space the new training club has to offer.
"We have turned some of the offices into crime scene rooms, so patrols can respond. Some of them look like barrack's rooms and others look like housing. We are setting the basement up to look like a company operations area -- there is a commander and first sergeant's office, operations center and a day room.
We also use the large dining facility for training. An active shooter can occur in any environment," Dauphin said.
Staff Sgt. Nevin Smith, Active Shooter Course instructor, said the move to the new training club also benefits training because his students are more focused on their class.
"It is a better facility than the urban operations site, because it has less distractions, such as units conducting field training exercises and the use of pyrotechnics," Smith said.
The MP AIT Soldiers aren't the only ones taking part in active shooter scenarios in the Audie Murphy Training Club.
Dauphin said the Marines already use the facility and a few other units are requesting their turn in the new training club.
"We are setting up for the Basic Officer Leader Course to hold their active shooter training here, the 92nd Military Police Battalion is planning on training here, and the Department of the Army civilian police are coordinating some training here, too," Dauphin said.
Social Sharing