TX - Uvalde; Robb Elementary, 19 children and 3 adults killed, shooter dead, 24 MAY 2022 #3

[Dotta]

"Safe Corners" is because of Parkland. He couldn't enter the rooms, they were locked, but fired through the glass in the door. Bullets wouldn't hit the safe corner and so nobody in them were injured.

This glass in the door is a bad idea.
Why not use a "door peephole"?

 

[Wise Old Owl]

"Safe Corners" is because of Parkland. He couldn't enter the rooms, they were locked, but fired through the glass in the door. Bullets wouldn't hit the safe corner and so nobody in them were injured.

Yep! A lot of revisions came from the Parkland shooting. The arming of teachers, and even the guardian law "Aron Feis" was enacted in Florida because of Parkland.

I saw something very interesting the other day on SM. A young, newly graduated teacher had been talking with her parents and they decided to put together a "go bag" for her room. She got a bullet proof vest, extra tourniquets (the new immediate responder kits only have like 2 or 3), a window punch, etc. and put them in a bag that she planned to keep in her desk.

WHAT AN IDEA!!!!! Kudos to her. If I were to ever go back into a classroom you betcha I make one of these!

What a shame that a TEACHER has to not only think of this, buy the stuff outta pocket and take it to her room. Who woulda thunk in modern America......................................................



JMHO

 

[Leve]

Yep! A lot of revisions came from the Parkland shooting. The arming of teachers, and even the guardian law "Aron Feis" was enacted in Florida because of Parkland.

I saw something very interesting the other day on SM. A young, newly graduated teacher had been talking with her parents and they decided to put together a "go bag" for her room. She got a bullet proof vest, extra tourniquets (the new immediate responder kits only have like 2 or 3), a window punch, etc. and put them in a bag that she planned to keep in her desk.

WHAT AN IDEA!!!!! Kudos to her. If I were to ever go back into a classroom you betcha I make one of these!

What a shame that a TEACHER has to not only think of this, buy the stuff outta pocket and take it to her room. Who woulda thunk in modern America......................................................



JMHO

Add a strobe light. In our local schools. In a lockdown. The door is locked, lights out, blinds closed, kids in safe corner and the teacher has a kit with a strobe light in it to temporarily blind anyone that makes it through the door. There are other things in this kit but they haven't been shared.

 

[Wise Old Owl]

Add a strobe light. In our local schools. In a lockdown. The door is locked, lights out, blinds closed, kids in safe corner and the teacher has a kit with a strobe light in it to temporarily blind anyone that makes it through the door. There are other things in this kit but they haven't been shared.

I go back to the "good ole days" when we were told to keep a can of wasp spray in our desks. That stuff can shoot (pretty accurately) a good 10-15 feet. And you can hit an intruder in the eyes from a distance. But, on the flip side - you hit an intruder with an AR in the eyes - he's just going to start pulling the trigger - so that's kinda not a good idea anymore either. *****sigh*****



JMHO

 

[Dotta]

Video: Former police commissioner reacts to Uvalde surveillance footage - CNN Video

Former Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey reacts after watching the full 77-minute surveillance footage of the Robb Elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

edition.cnn.com

 

[Seattle1]

Do they do drills now in schools for active shooters?

Yes, they do -- it's the law!

Both school district law enforcement and teachers & students conduct drills. The Uvalde police conducted an active shooter drill only two months earlier.

Unfortunately, it was only the teachers and students here that did what they were trained to do. The survivors have recounted how they went into "drill mode" that they've been practicing since pre-K.

Also, more than 500 students and teachers from Robb Elementary (and their parents) safely and successfully followed the published standard method for evacuation and reunification for students and parents.

SRM Parent Handout.pdf

drive.google.com

'It was the wrong decision': Did police in Uvalde ignore their own training?

Uvalde officials hosted an active shooter training session two months before Tuesday's mass shooting, raising questions about whether officers ignored their own training.

abcnews.go.com

Keep UCISD Safe / Homepage

www.ucisd.net

Texas school cops get standardized active shooter training. It didn't work in Uvalde

School police officers are trained in best practices for stopping an active shooter. The law requires it, and there's money to pay for it. And yet, that training seems to have failed in Uvalde, Texas.

www.npr.org

 

[Seattle1]

Lock was broken for 2 years and never fixed? Crazy. Sounds bad but who knows maybe this is a common thing in school districts or depending on the school district.. is there any info about the shooter’s cousin and where his classroom was at? Just when I think that I’ve read everything, I read something new. Such as the shooter had a cousin who went to this school.

^^BBM

The shooter reportedly asked his cousin about the staggered lunch periods at Robb Elementary.

And to have a cousin attending this school was hardly unusual! Given the population of Uvalde, it's long been reported that in addition to the shooter having attended Robb, so did the school district police chief, principal, and several teachers and responding officers.

 

[Only4Justice]

I have never had it either, but I live in Europe.

I wonder about hiding under the desks.

Isn't it better if the kids escape through the windows on the ground floor?

The windows in my school are big and situated low, so I'd rather run outside than stay like a sitting duck waiting for a maniac to shoot me.

Just asking as a complete novice in this matter.

I’m not really sure what the SOP for an active shooter would be in this school district but I’d assume the teachers would want to lock the door first and get the students away from any windows. And idk if they encourage kids to exit (if there is an exit door) unless they know for certain that there’s no threat outside. The teachers prob didn’t even know how many actors (shooters) were involved. And yeah, I suppose they’d probably get under desks. I think if I was a teacher, I’d also try to barricade the door or something just in case they were still able to breach the door, whether it was locked or not. This country needs to have some upgrades in ref to their preparations and drills for these situations. Idk the answers to this but obviously the drills they’re doing don’t always work. Especially when the gunmen comes in fully loaded with an AR and god knows what else. You know it’s bad in America when you occasionally wonder to yourself as a parent if this could happen to where your children go to school.. or if they’re better off home schooled. Where I live, we have one of the largest outdoor music festivals every summer and it’s basically a completely open festival and i always think in the back of my head how this could be so bad if someone chose to do something like that here. I especially started thinking that way after what happened in Las Vegas.

I went to a outdoor concert last weekend for the first time in a very long time. It was fabulous. But this was on my mind. What would I do? Run hide fight

 

[Arkay]

Add a strobe light. In our local schools. In a lockdown. The door is locked, lights out, blinds closed, kids in safe corner and the teacher has a kit with a strobe light in it to temporarily blind anyone that makes it through the door. There are other things in this kit but they haven't been shared.

I spent 25 years teaching in one middle school. We would never be allowed to have a strobe light, although I do see your point.

For us, everything was about not drawing attention to our presence (and not providing access, of course).

Locking the door was the most treacherous time. Our classroom doors, like most of the country, only lock from the outside. During drill we always practiced all the steps you mentioned—but to lock the door, we had to step into the hallway, look both ways to usher in any random kids in the hallway, THEN lock the door from the outside.

If there were a school shooter in the hall, that’s when he (I presume a male here) could shoot us or enter a classroom.

The one time we did have a shooter, we locked the doors, hid far from the door which had a pane of glass, kept the lights off and huddled silently (35 8th graders and me) until he gave up and we were released.

A strobe light, while I like the idea of temporarily blinding and disorienting a shooter, would be contrary to the ethos of “bring no attention to yourselves or students.” It’s entirely possible that he would shoot wildly in the direction of the light.

When I was a kid in the 1960s, we still practiced drills in case of a Soviet nuclear attack. Under the desk, for all the good that would do, although I vaguely remember signs directing us to some fallout shelter.

As a teacher in NYC I could not and would not ever arm myself. I’m recently retired but have three school-aged grandchildren, so it’s still a grave concern for me. In NYC, up until the recent Supreme Court ruling, very very few law-abiding civilians had guns. It’s not something I could or would personally do—-I’d have had to quit teaching if it came to that.

When you’re not raised in a gun culture, and you choose a profession that requires an empathetic and nurturing personality, for me it would be impossible to switch into any kind of gun-handling mode. Ever.

JMO

 

[Shamrock1]

Do they do drills now in schools for active shooters?

Yes. And not just schools - camp and daycare and weekend religious/language school (ex Sunday School/Hebrew School). One of mine had her first drill at 13mo. My bigger kids are at an 8-week camp program right now and they do 2 drills in those 8 weeks. I don't know specifics about laws/industry guidance, but in my experience the parents get notified after the drill and the school does not disclose much info beyond "FYI a drill took place" due to security concerns.

 

[cujenn81]

In my school district, employees are required to wear a card with the image below on it (along with our employee ID) on our badge holder.



I also just want to say that I’m so shocked the teacher’s door went unfixed for so long. There’s really no excuse for that. I work for my district’s Facilities department. Like most schools, we have a work order system in place. If a classroom door lock is broken, the teacher submits a work order. Work orders are organized and assigned to maintenance employees by order of importance. Anything that compromises the safety of our students (a door that doesn’t lock, for example) is given top priority and would be fixed the same day the work order was submitted. I can’t imagine a reason why the same wouldn’t be true for Uvalde.

The key situation also baffled me at first (although, now I’m not so sure there ever was a real hunt for any keys) because all admin, facility, and custodial employees should have a master key.

 

[Leve]

I spent 25 years teaching in one middle school. We would never be allowed to have a strobe light, although I do see your point.

For us, everything was about not drawing attention to our presence (and not providing access, of course).

Locking the door was the most treacherous time. Our classroom doors, like most of the country, only lock from the outside. During drill we always practiced all the steps you mentioned—but to lock the door, we had to step into the hallway, look both ways to usher in any random kids in the hallway, THEN lock the door from the outside.

If there were a school shooter in the hall, that’s when he (I presume a male here) could shoot us or enter a classroom.

The one time we did have a shooter, we locked the doors, hid far from the door which had a pane of glass, kept the lights off and huddled silently (35 8th graders and me) until he gave up and we were released.

A strobe light, while I like the idea of temporarily blinding and disorienting a shooter, would be contrary to the ethos of “bring no attention to yourselves or students.” It’s entirely possible that he would shoot wildly in the direction of the light.

When I was a kid in the 1960s, we still practiced drills in case of a Soviet nuclear attack. Under the desk, for all the good that would do, although I vaguely remember signs directing us to some fallout shelter.

As a teacher in NYC I could not and would not ever arm myself. I’m recently retired but have three school-aged grandchildren, so it’s still a grave concern for me. In NYC, up until the recent Supreme Court ruling, very very few law-abiding civilians had guns. It’s not something I could or would personally do—-I’d have had to quit teaching if it came to that.

When you’re not raised in a gun culture, and you choose a profession that requires an empathetic and nurturing personality, for me it would be impossible to switch into any kind of gun-handling mode. Ever.

JMO

I spent 25 years teaching in one middle school. We would never be allowed to have a strobe light, although I do see your point.

For us, everything was about not drawing attention to our presence (and not providing access, of course).

Locking the door was the most treacherous time. Our classroom doors, like most of the country, only lock from the outside. During drill we always practiced all the steps you mentioned—but to lock the door, we had to step into the hallway, look both ways to usher in any random kids in the hallway, THEN lock the door from the outside.

If there were a school shooter in the hall, that’s when he (I presume a male here) could shoot us or enter a classroom.

The one time we did have a shooter, we locked the doors, hid far from the door which had a pane of glass, kept the lights off and huddled silently (35 8th graders and me) until he gave up and we were released.

A strobe light, while I like the idea of temporarily blinding and disorienting a shooter, would be contrary to the ethos of “bring no attention to yourselves or students.” It’s entirely possible that he would shoot wildly in the direction of the light.

When I was a kid in the 1960s, we still practiced drills in case of a Soviet nuclear attack. Under the desk, for all the good that would do, although I vaguely remember signs directing us to some fallout shelter.

As a teacher in NYC I could not and would not ever arm myself. I’m recently retired but have three school-aged grandchildren, so it’s still a grave concern for me. In NYC, up until the recent Supreme Court ruling, very very few law-abiding civilians had guns. It’s not something I could or would personally do—-I’d have had to quit teaching if it came to that.

When you’re not raised in a gun culture, and you choose a profession that requires an empathetic and nurturing personality, for me it would be impossible to switch into any kind of gun-handling mode. Ever.

JMO

The kits are given to all of the teachers. I'm really not sure what's all in them. I think the strobe is just used if a shooter breaches the locked doors.

All the classroom doors are locked all day.

 

[sds71]

“Systemic failures” in Uvalde shooting went far beyond local police, Texas House report details

In total, 376 law enforcement officers descended upon the school, according to the most extensive account of the shooting to date. It says that better-equipped departments should have stepped up to fill a leadership void after the Uvalde schools police chief failed to take charge.

www.texastribune.org

 

[Dotta]

“Systemic failures” in Uvalde shooting went far beyond local police, Texas House report details

In total, 376 law enforcement officers descended upon the school, according to the most extensive account of the shooting to date. It says that better-equipped departments should have stepped up to fill a leadership void after the Uvalde schools police chief failed to take charge.

www.texastribune.org

376 officers???

"In total, 376 law enforcement officers — a force larger than the garrison that defended the Alamo — descended upon the school in a chaotic, uncoordinated scene that lasted for more than an hour. The group was devoid of clear leadership, basic communications and sufficient urgency to take down the gunman, the report says."

 

[Seattle1]

“Systemic failures” in Uvalde shooting went far beyond local police, Texas House report details

In total, 376 law enforcement officers descended upon the school, according to the most extensive account of the shooting to date. It says that better-equipped departments should have stepped up to fill a leadership void after the Uvalde schools police chief failed to take charge.

www.texastribune.org

When I viewed the 77-minute video (in 20-minute increments), I was unable to locate and/or identify Chief PA in the entire video!

I suspect during the first 20-minutes, he was standing under the surveillance camera out of view (probably directly behind the "corner wall huggers" at the entrance to the corridor of the subject classroom wing.

We know that Chief PA could not communicate with the later arriving, better trained and equipped officers outside the building because he intentionally left his two police radios behind -- believing they would physically impede his movement.

From the hallway surveillance video, during the first 12-15 minutes when only two officers physically responded to and continued to rush towards the gunfire (beige officer and tall, Uvalde uniform officer), Chief PA could have at any time directed one or more of the corner huggers to go outside and inform one of the better-qualified arriving officers outside the school building to take over as incident commander. At that time, the new incident commander would have quickly known Chief PA's decision of a barricaded shooter was incorrect and could have overruled the Chief's plan which was wasting precious time. (Personally, I can't see the Chief ever relinquishing IC-- he wanted this feather, until he didn't).

I also believe if no other officers responded to Robb Elementary except for the beige officer and the Uvalde uniform cop, both would have likely perished in the first 10 minutes but not before taking down the gunman. And 67 minutes could have been devoted to saving the lives of the injured that likely bled out. MOO

From the link:

The report listed several ways that an effective incident commander outside the school might have helped: The commander might have noticed that radios weren’t working well and found a better way to communicate. They might have found a master key to the school faster to get inside the classroom where the shooter was barricaded — or suggested checking to make sure the door was locked. Or they might have urged officers to find another way to get inside the classroom.

But Arredondo told The Texas Tribune in June that he did not consider himself the incident commander after he was one of the first officers to arrive inside the school. He said he assumed another officer outside would fill that role.

The committee did not find this argument persuasive. It cited the school district’s active shooter response plan, co-authored by Arredondo, which states the chief will “become the person in control of the efforts of all law enforcement and first responders that arrive at the scene.” The school district last month placed him on administrative leave.

But blame for the flawed police response extends far beyond the school district police chief of a six-officer department, the report concludes.

The report criticized other officers and law enforcement agencies, many of them better trained, for failing to fill the leadership vacuum left by Arredondo’s inaction.

“In this crisis, no responder seized the initiative to establish an incident command post,” the committee wrote. “Despite an obvious atmosphere of chaos, the ranking officers of other responding agencies did not approach the Uvalde CISD chief of police or anyone else perceived to be in command to point out the lack of and need for a command post, or to offer that specific assistance.”

 

[Dotta]

When I viewed the 77-minute video (in 20-minute increments), I was unable to locate and/or identify Chief PA in the entire video!

I suspect during the first 20-minutes, he was standing under the surveillance camera out of view (probably directly behind the "corner wall huggers" at the entrance to the corridor of the subject classroom wing.

We know that Chief PA could not communicate with the later arriving, better trained and equipped officers outside the building because he intentionally left his two police radios behind -- believing they would physically impede his movement.

From the hallway surveillance video, during the first 12-15 minutes when only two officers physically responded to and continued to rush towards the gunfire (beige officer and tall, Uvalde uniform officer), Chief PA could have at any time directed one or more of the corner huggers to go outside and inform one of the better-qualified arriving officers outside the school building to take over as incident commander. At that time, the new incident commander would have quickly known Chief PA's decision of a barricaded shooter was incorrect and could have overruled the Chief's plan which was wasting precious time. (Personally, I can't see the Chief ever relinquishing IC-- he wanted this feather, until he didn't).

I also believe if no other officers responded to Robb Elementary except for the beige officer and the Uvalde uniform cop, both would have likely perished in the first 10 minutes but not before taking down the gunman. And 67 minutes could have been devoted to saving the lives of the injured that likely bled out. MOO

From the link:

The report listed several ways that an effective incident commander outside the school might have helped: The commander might have noticed that radios weren’t working well and found a better way to communicate. They might have found a master key to the school faster to get inside the classroom where the shooter was barricaded — or suggested checking to make sure the door was locked. Or they might have urged officers to find another way to get inside the classroom.

But Arredondo told The Texas Tribune in June that he did not consider himself the incident commander after he was one of the first officers to arrive inside the school. He said he assumed another officer outside would fill that role.

The committee did not find this argument persuasive. It cited the school district’s active shooter response plan, co-authored by Arredondo, which states the chief will “become the person in control of the efforts of all law enforcement and first responders that arrive at the scene.” The school district last month placed him on administrative leave.

But blame for the flawed police response extends far beyond the school district police chief of a six-officer department, the report concludes.

The report criticized other officers and law enforcement agencies, many of them better trained, for failing to fill the leadership vacuum left by Arredondo’s inaction.

“In this crisis, no responder seized the initiative to establish an incident command post,” the committee wrote. “Despite an obvious atmosphere of chaos, the ranking officers of other responding agencies did not approach the Uvalde CISD chief of police or anyone else perceived to be in command to point out the lack of and need for a command post, or to offer that specific assistance.”

This is not the only failure in TX recently - remember the inmate who escaped from the prison bus in Centerville and a month later killed 5 people??

 

[Seattle1]

In my school district, employees are required to wear a card with the image below on it (along with our employee ID) on our badge holder.

View attachment 354628

I also just want to say that I’m so shocked the teacher’s door went unfixed for so long. There’s really no excuse for that. I work for my district’s Facilities department. Like most schools, we have a work order system in place. If a classroom door lock is broken, the teacher submits a work order. Work orders are organized and assigned to maintenance employees by order of importance. Anything that compromises the safety of our students (a door that doesn’t lock, for example) is given top priority and would be fixed the same day the work order was submitted. I can’t imagine a reason why the same wouldn’t be true for Uvalde.

The key situation also baffled me at first (although, now I’m not so sure there ever was a real hunt for any keys) because all admin, facility, and custodial employees should have a master key.

See post #386 -- OP's badge is not unlike the SRP K12 poster at the Keep UCISD Safe/Homepage website for Rob Elementary. So sad for the community.

 

[sds71]

"There was no legal impediment to the attacker buying two AR-15-style rifles, 60 magazines, and over 2,000 rounds of ammunition when he turned 18. The ATF was not required to notify the local sheriff of the multiple purchases."

The attacker developed sociopathic and violent tendencies, but he received no mental health assistance... the attacker expressed suicidal ideation to a cousin, who talked to him and did not believe he was an imminent suicide risk.

Principal Mandy Gutierrez never attempted to communicate the lockdown over the school’s intercom system.

Robb Elementary School Coach Yvette Silva acted heroically and almost certainly saved lives by alerting the school to the attacker’s advance. Most fourth grade classes successfully locked down as a result of her quick response.

The report says a boy was found in the bathroom stall with his legs up. The boy refused to come out until the agent showed his badge under the door.

"Acting on effectively the same information available to Chief Arredondo, including an assumption of injured victims in the room, BORTAC commander on scene waited until arranging a rifle-rated shield and obtaining a working master key before attempting to breach the classrooms."
"While officers acted on the assumption that the doors to Rooms 111 and 112 were locked, as they were designed to be, nobody tested that assumption”

https://www.kxan.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/40/2022/07/Robb-Elementary-Investigative-Committee-Report-Fullsize.pdf

https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/22088421/texas-house-committee-report-uvalde.pdf

https://twitter.com/MarkJRemillard
The report on the #Uvalde school shooting says this screen grab shared with the media was edited. The gunman had texted a 15-year-old girl in Germany that he was going to shoot up a school, but before this screen grab was taken her response of "Cool" was deleted.

For the incident command situation, which has come under fire during the last eight weeks since the shooting, the reports summery states UCISD written Active Shooter Plan directed its police chief to assume command and control of the response. That is Chief Pete Arredondo
The interim report from the Texas House Investigative Committee sheds light from Uvalde schools police Chief Pete Arredondo and his thinking on the day of the tragedy at Robb Elementary

 

[carlymichelle]

am i hearing this right CNN said there was 400 police at the scene and none of them did anything?

 

[carlymichelle]

i dont understand any of this here in australia we dont have school shootings but all primary schools surroundings are locked and gated and parents/carers have to be scanned in and the schools are fenced and the front gate locked