Emergency workers stage casualty drill
CATHERINE RODRIGUEZ
Pocono Record Writer
October 08, 2006
The Stroud Township Fire Department and Suburban EMS responded to a chemical spill that killed a number of people
and Stroud Area Regional Police and their SWAT team successfully negotiated the release of several hostages at
Stroudsburg Intermediate Elementary School.
Well ... not really.
Monroe County's first-ever Mass Casualty Drill, dubbed "Monroe Vigilance," was staged at the school complex on
Chipperfield Drive Saturday morning, including police, fire, EMS, and coroner operations, along with Monroe County's
Dispatch Center and Pocono Medical Center.
Under the watchful eye of Cocciardi and Associates, a group that plans and administers exercises such as these,
scenarios were set up and acted from start to finish.
Students from Keystone College were the victims; some were "killed" in the chemical attack, others were "injured" and
several became "hostages." Jay Selwood, 20, a freshman, said their role in the exercise was part of the first-year
seminar that helps freshmen adjust to campus life.
"It was an easy 'A'," Selwood said. "And we don't have to get wet like in some other drills." He played a patient with
arm lacerations, blood in his ears, runny eyes and nose, and he "smelled funny," an allusion to the chemicals. He was
said to be "fearful."
Another student, Chris Reinwald, was playing the part of a 4-year-old boy who lives near the school and was "crying
and fearful, and was panicking."
"It's cool playing a victim," he said. "I don't mind."
What ultimately happened to their characters isn't known.
"This drill has been in the works for 10 months," said Bob Groff, who was the information officer for the drill. "It has
nothing to do with the recent school shootings."
It was originally planned to be a much larger exercise, according to Groff. The late Harry Robidoux had been working
with Cocciardi on a drill that would have encompassed almost all of Monroe County.
"Harry's death in July caused the exercise to be scaled back," said Groff.
Cocciardi works with municipalities on planning, preparing and critiquing drills, and has worked with several of the
other counties in the eight-county Northeast Pennsylvania Counter-Terrorism Task Force, which includes Monroe,
Carbon, Luzerne, Lackawanna, Susquehanna, Lehigh, Pike and Wayne. The latter two are the only ones that have not
yet held a drill, and they are scheduled for the spring.
Wayne County lost everything in last June's flooding and is currently in the process of moving into a school building
that was recently purchased.
The scenario that was used for Saturday's drill centered on a violent white supremacist/anti-government organization
that was bent on the overthrow of the federal government and establishment of a new nation. Raids of several
methamphetamine labs resulted in the arrest of their national leader and other high-level operatives. The group
supported themselves by selling methamphetamines and bank robberies. All of the labs were heavily fortified and large
amounts of weapons were found along with stores of ricin, an extremely toxic chemical.
The group led authorities to believe that a significant event would happen over the weekend of Oct. 7.
At about 9:15 a.m. Saturday, simultaneous calls to 911 operators were received from the intermediate school reporting
that people were affected by some sort of chemical release by armed individuals. First responders were dispatched.
SARP established a command center and asked for additional EMS units as well as the 911 Center Incident Command
Post. There were reports of dead people in and around the building. A mass decontamination area was set up and a
water supply officer identified for the decontamination activities.
Pocono Medical Center was notified and told to expect contaminated victims. At one point, 10 contaminated people
showed up unannounced at the emergency room. A short while later, a group of "worried, well" people showed up at
the hospital, those who were not injured but were concerned for their health, and they were given public health
information.
While all this was going on, police and fire officials were working together to decontaminate victims and identify those
that were dead and those who would need help to get cleaned up and checked out.
The dead were taken to a makeshift morgue; the coroner's office was called and the mass fatality team was requested.
Groff, acting as information officer, went from place to place checking up on operations and making sure everything
was being done properly. As the focus of the drill shifted from public health to a hostage situation, the angle changed a
bit. The "shooters" took hostages and the leader could be heard screaming, "I want to talk to somebody!"
Stroudsburg's SWAT team slowly crept around the side of the round building which houses Stroudsburg Intermediate
Elementary School, while snipers set up in various locations around the school.
Lt. Brian Kimmins of the Stroud Area Regional Police arrived and assisted with negotiating. All it took to get two
hostages released was a pizza. The gunman's cell phone went dead and a "throw phone" was activated so police could
still talk to him.
At times it felt as though nothing was happening. "It's supposed to look that way," Kimmins said. "As long as the
gunman is talking, he's not shooting anyone."
"This is the worst kind of building to have a hostage crisis in because it's round. There are no corners and no windows
in some areas. The only building that would be worse than this is a high-rise," he added.
Eventually, all ended well. The participants gathered in the multimedia room at the junior high school for a debriefing.
Cocciardi Associates gave everyone high marks, especially considering it was the first drill for everyone. The SWAT
team was given high praise for its diligence and good outcome.
"Drills like this are an excellent opportunity to find out how to work
together and where our weaknesses are," said
Kimmins. "We get money from Homeland Security for individual training. Now we have to figure out how to work as a
team. We work with the school districts because they have their own plan, so we have to get them to mesh."
During the debriefing, which was kept short, quick critiques were given as an overview of the entire exercise.
Very high marks were given to the SWAT team, which successfully ended the hostage situation, and the coroner team
was praised for its proactive handling of their problems. Cocciardi representatives said that the coroner's office went to
the command center with their problems and their questions were answered. Coroners did not have the resources for
decontaminating the dead, but they went out and used the resources at hand.
A more thorough report will be put together and sent to the agencies involved so that they can work on their weak
spots and improve their overall performance.
The drill will probably be repeated next year, and it is possible that a drill centered in the northern part of the county
could happen next year as well.
Lessons were learned and ideas shared in what could have been a horrific situation, had it been real. And nobody got
hurt.
http://www.cocciardi.com/monroe.pdf?ID=7