Police, paramedics unite for innovative training to save more lives in active shootings

Stop the bleeding, save a life — those are the goals first responders are taught to focus on when entering an active shooter scenario.

Now, police officers and paramedics are learning how to achieve those goals side by side, with crews from Tallahassee the first to go through training at a new regional law enforcement hub on Monday.

"Whatever area they go in, they got to secure it, and if there's victims in there, treat those victims while they're still looking for the assailant," said Al Brotons, director of training operations at the University of Miami's Gordon Center. "That's new. We've never done this before."

The Gordon Center partnered with the Florida Public Safety Institute at Tallahassee Community College to create Florida's first regional hub in the capital city that will provide the collaborative training for law enforcement officers.

The course was created at the university and is funded by a grant from the Florida Department of Education, making it free to municipalities that want to offer it.

Training EMS alongside police for better response

The usual response to active shooter scenarios occurs in phases: First law enforcement neutralizes the threat, then paramedics go in once the area is cleared.

But some people don't have the time this method takes, especially when minutes and seconds count.

"And as we know from past history, the only way we're going to be able to save a life is if we are able to interject that medic into that environment within minutes," Brotons said.

Monday's training day ended with a simulation in the classrooms of the old Gretna Elementary School in Gadsden County. Students from Gadsden County High School were selected to be the victims of a mock shooting, giving first responders a sense of a real-life situation.

Decked out with fake blood and wounds, they screamed for help in the classrooms, testing the first responders' efficiency in a fabricated emergency.

The simulation allows medics to practice techniques like needle decompression, packing wounds and applying tourniquets, Brotons said. He noted that the use of tourniquets is integrated into the training program because of military input provided when developing the course.

"They may not keep that limb, but they'll at least keep their life," said Logan Lane, director of continuing education at the Florida Public Safety Institute.

Lane said the training is really unique because paramedics are in the "warm areas" treating injuries, while the law enforcement continues into the "hot areas where the bad guy is."

"We're training them to understand we're going to send you with protection," he said. "You're not completely barren, but at the same time, there is a risk. But everybody knows when they get in this job, there's risk with what we do."

Brotons said some of the places they've trained people unfortunately had real-life situations right after they left. But the first responders said they wouldn't have been prepared without the training.

This is not something that police and medics respond to every day, he said, so practicing it to be calm under pressure is crucial. "It's an unfortunate type of training we have to do, but we have to do it," he said.

Elena Barrera can be reached at ebarrera@tallahassee.com. Follow her on X: @elenabarreraaa.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Training police, paramedics to respond to active shooters together