The week started the morning of July 29 with a water-rescue exercise at Bass Lake in Area A, which sent emergency personnel to the site where a fisherman had reported seeing a boater’s kayak overturn.
Elsewhere on base exercise, intelligence messages generated and sent out helped build a scenario where the information provided would show officials the increased potential for imminent terrorist activities. Each successive exercise message provided more details concerning an increasingly valid threat to the base from hostile external actors.
On July 30, with the exercise terrorist threat building, additional critical messages filtered to the appropriate offices of responsibility for discussion and action. The Wright-Patterson Threat Working Group convened to see what might be done to mitigate any potential harm to the installation, its people and its mission using appropriate force protection condition, or FPCON, measures.
FPCON Charlie was implemented base-wide, and as a result, personnel responsible for responding to the higher measures consulted checklists and took actions to meet each line item. This portion of the base-wide exercise lasted for 24-hours from July 30 to July 31.
With the FPCON changes now past, two new exercise challenges were thrust upon the base on Aug. 1.
Installation leadership and those offices tasked with active-shooter response efforts converged in a “table-top” setting. There they talked through the procedures, the responsibilities and the implications, both on and off the installation of an active shooter event on Wright-Patterson.
The table-top construct provided an opportunity for all of the players involved to have a clear view of actions to be taken by all others during such an incident. As a result, lessons-learned can be incorporated into plans and checklists to make a future actual active-shooter response more effective.
Later that day, a simulated gas explosion at an event on base at the War Fighter Training Center resulted in “fatalities” and multiple injuries, including shrapnel wounds and burns on several victims. Clouds of smoke and the “pained” cries of victim volunteers wearing moulage to simulate injuries awaited the responders arriving on the scene. First aid was administered; victims were transported; the fire was extinguished, and fatalities were located and processed.
Throughout the course of the busy week many organizations exercised small, localized events. At other venues around Wright-Patterson, personnel in those locations exercised on the use of an automated external defibrillator. These portable electronic devices, when used properly, can automatically diagnose potentially life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias and then, through defibrillation, allow the heart to reestablish an effective rhythm.
Still other units practiced unit-specific activities related to their specific missions or work centers.
The next base-wide exercise is scheduled for Nov. 4-8.
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