TERRORISM: Terror Drill at New York's Shea Stadium

The largest terror drill since September 11, 2001 occurred at Shea Stadium in New York today. More than 2000 people were involved in the mock attacks, with over 1000 Firefighters, Police and Paramedics working together.

Mock Bombs at Shea Stadium in New York's Largest Terror Drill Since Sept. 11, 2001, Attacks
Mayor Michael Bloomberg said last week's bombing of commuter trains in Madrid underscored the need for the exercise, the city's 40th designed to help city agencies improve communication and coordination in the face of a potential attack. After the attack on the World Trade Center outside experts criticized interagency coordination, particularly between police and firefighters, as inadequate.
Other Sources:
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[Edited on 3-14-2004 by worldwatcher]

I haven't seen any replies, but as a participant in this drill it would be my pleasure to answer any questions anyone may have about it. I believe it was informative and FUN. Yes fun... weird huh. Such circumstances and you can have fun. What was fun was that the different agencies actually got to meet each other and work together on something in a semi-stressful but not deadly environment. It was fun to meet colleagues from all over the city, share stories, hang out a bit during the wait time etc. I learned a lot from it personally. Besides informative and fun it was cold. Very cold.

So yeah if anyone has any questions about it, or wants to talk about it, feel free to either post here or send me a u2u it would be my pleasure to share my experiences.

BTW nothing is as funny as a fdny trainee in perfect health clutching his chest and saying "i was hit by debris from the explosion and i cant breathe!!" especially a trainee im friends with. luckily there were some lighthearted moments like that

I'm curious as to what exactly happened. What was the set-up? Do you have an account of all the events? Do you think that they'll do this in more cities? If it was successful in NYC, might as well prepare the rest of the country. It would have been really interesting to participate - did they let the public participate, or just the professional agencies? Sorry if this is too many questions, but I'm quite curious about it.

Sure, it would be my pleasure to answer those questions.

Basically the following was the scenario. An explosion occured in the stadium. After the first explosion emergency responders were deployed from their stations (which were actually in the Shea parking lot for the excersize). A few moments later they were informed that there was the possibility of secondary devices, and then those were confirmed. When the scene was determined to be safe by investigators, trained medical personnel were allowed in to assist patients. It worked as follows:

Patients wore tags around their necks describing what was wrong with them. Based on that the first group of personnel would put a colored tag on them.

Green = walking wounded (maybe a sprained ankle, or some small cuts),
Yellow = needs treatment fairly soon (maybe a broken arm)
Red = needs treatment now (someone with a major wound, or someone breathing more than 30 times a minute)
Black = don't bother. Sad... I know. but when dealing with mutiple casualties you can't waste limited resources on someone who won't make it anyways when there's dozens of others who have a chance. (Someone not breathing at all would get a black tag)

Those patients (who were volunteers and trainees from different agencies) would simulate being hurt, including the patient's mental state, would be loaded onto ambulances and taken out to an area of the parking lot where response times, transport times, treatments administered etc would be evaluated. Also many patients were brought to hospitals around the city.

In the midst of all this, word was spread that a man was found with suspicious documents and was being searched and frisked etc.

We did not encounter anything too far out of hand thanfully. We weren't simulating someone dropping a nuke on us or anything, but there were many possibilities for the explosion. Was it a dirty bomb, any chemical or bio agents? We had respirators, masks, helmets, suits etc...

All in all, a very very very productive excersize. I'd HIGHLY recommend other cities doing this as well. It's pricey as hell, but just the opportunity to get the various agencies together and working with each other makes it all worth it.

I know that if something happens in NYC, the people who participated in the drill will be better equipped to deal with it. Money well spent.


Sorry I missed the last part of your question. The professional agencies who participated were FDNY, EMS, NYPD, OEM (emergency management), OME (Medical Examiner), and a few others of that sort. Additionally, representatives of at least 5 or 6 volunteer Ambulance groups were active participants as well. The patients were auxiliary cops, FDNY trainees, EMS students etc. I didn't see any "civilians" really except a lot of press coverage. Everyone who was there had a job to do and otherwise the area was quite restricted.

[Edited on 3-15-2004 by Djarums]