FORT JACKSON, SC -- On the morning of April 7, Fort Jackson's Directorate of Emergency Services personnel responded to a distress call regarding a pseudo-shooter who had taken over a building on post.
The mock siege called for the responders to assess the situation and neutralize the threat before evacuating the wounded, establishing a crime scene, and maintaining accountability of personnel, said Patrick O'Connor, deputy director for DES.
The scenario was designed to imitate incidents similar to that of the mass shooting that occurred last November at Fort Hood, Texas.
The joint training exercise involved Fort Jackson's military police, security guards, firefighters, emergency medical services, the emergency operations center, the 911 call center and incident command, as well as outside agencies such as the Richland County Sheriff's Department and the Columbia Fire Department.
It was an operation to "exercise our law enforcement, our medical response and our rescue response, and to also incorporate an agreement we have with the Richland County Sheriff's Department to assist us if we ever exceeded the capacity of our own resources," O'Connor said.
"In a real life situation we would respond to assist Fort Jackson, and Fort Jackson to (assist) the county, if need be," Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said.
In 2009, DES established a formal agreement with the Richland County Sheriff's Department, allowing the county's Special Response Team to assist in high-risk law-enforcement operations at Fort Jackson.
"This memorandum between the sheriff's department and the Fort Jackson emergency directorate allows for us to work toward making Fort Jackson and Richland County a safe place to work, live and play," Lott said. Lott said the agreement is the first of its kind.
"These (joint training) exercises are invaluable to both Fort Jackson and the sheriff's department," he added. "Since we have trained together, we will be prepared and be able to respond in sync, God forbid a real life situation occurs."
The main obstacle DES personnel face while working with Richland County, or any other outside agency, is communication, O'Connor said.
"I think the biggest thing we get out of this (training) is the understanding of how each agency responds," O'Connor said. "Working on our terminology and knowing the capabilities of each agency so when we do call somebody, we know what they bring to the table. We know what they offer for the event.
"We can't communicate with each other until they get on scene," he said.
DES and Richland County also use radios that transmit signals via different frequencies. So in order to communicate, they must relay information back and forth from a command center set up at the scene.
"There are some things we need to work on," O'Connor said. "But I think everything (during this exercise) went well. We achieved all our training objectives."
"The cooperation and commitment between Fort Jackson and the sheriff's department is second to none," Lott said. "We train together and constantly communicate because what affects and concerns the citizens on post is the same as what affects and concerns the citizens off post."
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