NORFOPLK, Va. — Panicked screams from people running out of the airport at Naval Station Norfolk kicked off a large-scale active shooter exercise Wednesday.
“The scenario would be that we have four armed assailants that, as a plane was landing and personnel were getting off the plane, they just got their weapons out of locked gun cases and whatever in their mind snapped and they just commenced shooting personnel inside the air terminal," Naval Station Norfolk Installation Training Director Deric Graham explained.
One of the four shooters was outside the airport firing a machine gun.
Law enforcement officers from multiple agencies, both on and off base, responded and took out the shooter and then went inside the airport where they took out the other shooters and tended to victims.
News
Chesapeake Police, city employees hold active shooter training at City Hall
Along with overall response, the exercise was also meant to test communication.
“One of the common drums we’re beating is communication. With being a DoD asset and local law enforcement, trying to bridge our radios to their radios," Graham said.
Naval Station Norfolk Commanding Officer, Capt. Janet Days, said these large-scale exercises aren’t done often because they take a lot of planning and coordination.
This exercise took months to plan.
“I was very pleased with, one, just the motivation and the energy and the excitement, but two the information flow. What I received here from the incident command post was accurate, which is key," Days said. "One of my priority goals when I took command in February was we were going to run a large-scale active shooter drill before the end of the year."
Coast Live
Naval Station Norfolk's history-making commanding officer on Coast Live
She watched over the exercise from the naval station’s emergency operation center.
“(The) emergency operations center is the nexus of Naval Station Norfolk. All the information, everything that is happening on the scene is being fused into here and in different lanes because there’s different responsibilities," Days said.
A very involved, realistic, and certainly important exercise.
“We don’t want to get to know each other and develop a relationship when an incident occurs. This, right here, builds bridges," said Days.
After the first exercise, there was a second, slower exercise that allowed participants to make corrections from the first exercise.
