School district holds active-shooter training

REARDAN - The Reardan-Edwall School District conducted realistic active shooter training at the school Friday, July 21, preparing for something it hopes never happens.

Local and state law enforcement agencies, along with local emergency medical services and police chaplains, all converged on the school in what event organizer Brad Eylar called "an amazing success."

At 11:15 a.m., four men clad in black and armed with simulated weapons entered the school through unlocked doors. The men, all security forces personnel from Fairchild Air Force Base, ran down the halls and entered classrooms, "opening fire" on volunteer community members who represented staff and students.

Reardan Police chief Mike Suniga was one of the first responders to the school. Soon afterwards, personnel from the Washington State Patrol, Lincoln County Sheriff's Office, Spokane County Sheriff's Office, Spokane Tribal Police, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Odessa Police Department arrived on the scene.

Crews quickly assembled into small groups to pursue the "shooters," who had split up and were roaming the elementary, middle and high schools.

Police entered the school and hurried towards the sounds of screams and gunfire, their goal being to neutralize the "shooter" as quickly as possible. When located, law enforcement "killed" or apprehended the "shooter." If the "shooter" was not found, the police moved methodically room-by-room, constantly in communication with the command center at the fire department and with each other.

After law enforcement deemed a part of the school safe, emergency medical personnel from the Reardan Fire Department and Davenport EMS swooped in. The injured were brought to the elementary school library, where they were triaged and provided medical care.

There, they were also offered emotional and spiritual help by Reardan and Spokane Police Department chaplain Pat Hogan and chaplains from the Spokane County Sheriff's Office.

"The role of chaplains in this type of incident is to make sure people are cared for and if they have trauma to help them walk through it," Hogan said.

Four hours after the incident began, Suniga and officers from the state police and Spokane County Sheriff's Office cornered the final perpetrator in a storage room in the gym. They approached the door with weapons drawn and ordered him to surrender.

As police escorted him in handcuffs out of the building, the exercise ended. All perpetrators were "killed" or "arrested," the "wounded" were cared for and Eylar and his team gained valuable experience he hopes they never have to use.

"Our goal was to practice all the training we've done during the year in one event," Eylar said. "This is the culminating training exercise for law enforcement and medical personnel and allows us to work together on crisis response. From what I've observed, they have all done an amazing job of working together."

Eylar was especially impressed with the tactical expertise, communication and teamwork displayed by all law enforcement and medical personnel.

"How seriously everyone took this training shows how amazing they are and how much they care about student safety," Eylar said.

Suniga praised the training as extremely beneficial as it will further ensure the community remains safe.

"Rehearsal is 90% of problem solving," he said. "I think the training was very good. The agencies interacted well. We could identify some deficiencies that we can now work on so we can be even more prepared."

Parent Mark Lassman volunteered to be a role player in one scenario. As one of the "shooting victims," he experienced the chaos of an active shooter event and witnessed the actions of those committed to help him.

"I was impressed with the turnout of law enforcement, firefighters, EMTs and the community members who showed up to support this training," Lassman said. "God forbid something tragic like this happens, but now I know and appreciate what responders are doing inside the school to help our kids."

Superintendent Eric Sobotta called the exercise "sobering." He said that just hoping an active shooter event doesn't happen is not a strategy.

"We are going to make sure our district is as safe as possible," Sobotta said. "Brad Eylar did an absolutely amazing job facilitating this event."

School board member Jeff Anderson, who observed each scenario, was grateful to the district for placing a top priority on this training.

"Nothing is more important in our school district than the safety of our kids," he said.