Police, fire and EMS train in Grand Rapids active shooter simulation

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — First responders spent Tuesday morning practicing their response to an active shooter situation through a simulation at Grand Rapids Community College.

The training was held on the M-TEC campus on Godfrey Ave SW just south of Market Ave SW, bringing together nearly a dozen departments and agencies. Organizers of the training worked to make it seem as realistic as possible.

In an emergency, seconds can make a difference and first responders want to be ready to work seamlessly with other departments.

“We don’t normally blend our training with other departments but something as critical as this we know there’s gonna be a lot of departments and a lot of resources involved so it was great to do a practice run because we know we want to be prepared. We know how likely this could happen in our city or a neighboring city,” said Deputy Chief Joseph Trigg with the Grand Rapids Police Department.

The simulation brought together state, federal and local law enforcement.

“We can handle an incident almost perfect. We’re still gonna critique the heck out of it and figure out how we can get better that’s just how we do things. I know other agencies do so as well,” Trigg said.

The training also used a variety of equipment, so the team knows how to use its resources.

“We don’t know how well things work or where we need to improve on unless we actively put it all together in a full scale or active play scenario,” said Allison Farole, the emergency management administrator for the City of Grand Rapids.

The department holds full-scale trainings like this every couple years because of the amount of work it takes to get everything planned.

“This is usually about a year in advance of planning so it’s not something we do all the time but it’s really important for us to take scenarios as critical as an active shooter incident and practice what those plans say or the training that we’ve gone through looks like and does in an actual exercise environment,” Farole said.

Chief Rebecca Whitman with GRCC Police says having so many accredited agencies involved in the training makes integrating the staff easier.

“Even though we train separately. We train on very similar practices so I would say that it’s easier to integrate because we do communicate with each other, and we do know what each other are doing,” Whitman said.

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