Havoc reigned Wednesday morning at Clarksburg High School in upper Montgomery County.
Three shooters gunned down fellow students and wounded the principal, a bomb exploded in a van outside the building, sprinkler systems flooded the school and lightning struck the school grounds.
Except it all was a drill.
“The role-playing began with a female student going up to the principal and saying, ‘I think my ex-boyfriend might do something at school today; he said that Clarksburg High School would feel his wrath today and that it would makeColumbine look like small potatoes,’ ” Montgomery County police spokeswoman Lucille Baur said.
This emergency exercise was more than a year in the planning, Baur said, and was designed to test how public safety, school staff security and rescue responders would react in an emergency situation.
The exact details of the simulated emergency were kept secret from participants until the day of the event.
“After the shootings occurred on the campus of Virginia Tech, the determination was made that we wanted to make this exercise a reality before the start of the school year,” Baur said.
Two hundred firefighters, emergency medical service workers, police officers, school security officers, and student and teacher volunteers participated in the mock disaster experience.
“We learned if we send in the right people, with the right training and an aggressive spirit, they can take care of the problem,” Montgomery County Police Lt. Philip Raum said.
Raum said he thought the coordination between responders from state, county and city forces could benefit from practice.
“Time is our enemy in disaster situations,” Baur said. “We’ve got to make [an] instant decision to save lives.”
