Rob Shuster, AFIMAC VP on WTAP NEWS – Active Shooter Critical Moments
December 14, 2015Rob Shuster of AFIMAC discusses active shooter incidents with WTAP NEWS.
Shootings in businesses and public offices are nothing new.
But in the past, they’ve been motivated by people with largely personal issues.
Because of that, companies have surfaced to help employees take a pro–‐active stance to deal with them.
“People can, out of panic and out of fear, do things you wouldn’t expect them to do,” says Ron Shuster, Vice–‐President for training, AFIMAC “They’ll freeze; they’ll take things out with them, some of them will understand that priority one is to evacuate; some of them will not. Some of them will do things that will make things more difficult for the responding police officers, and they have to be schooled not to do those things.”
AFIMAC provides active shooter training for businesses and similar organizations. Another company, Dark Angel Medical, helps responders prepare for those incidents.
But one of its officials says fighting back is one way not to deal with a mass gunman.
“Police are going to be coming, and I’m not going to be running out of the store with my gun out, because they’ll think I’m the bad guy,” says Dark Angel co–‐founder Lynn Davis. “I’m going to be trying to move away from the dangerous situation, and my main mission is to protect my husband and my child.”
Both companies say due to events of the past month, active shooter training may be evolving.
“I suspect that will happen, given Paris,” Shuster says. “I think it’s ridiculous to assume that won’t happen here. But it did happen in Paris.” AFIMAC was started in the 1980s by former Washington County commissioner James Vuksic.
Dark Angel plans a training exercise next June in Reno, Ohio, just outside Marietta.
