RISK Alert Alert #530 – Fort Hood Active Shooter-April 2, 2014
Dateline: April 5, 2014
Shock and grief were the reactions when the news said, for a second time, a shooter
inside Ft. Hood near Killeen, Texas had killed 4 and injured 13 in another Active Shooting
Incident. Everyone remembered the first major shooting attack in November 2013, when
a major killed 13 and injured 43 because he did not want to be deployed to Afghanistan.
A total of 73 injured and/or killed in the two incidents!
How could this have happened? The Department of Defense had implemented many of
the recommendations of its internal, and independent review panels, and the changes had not
been enough to prevent another active Shooter incident.
The 34-year old shooter had apparently been denied a leave form, and asked to come
back the next day and he came back, with a .45-caliber Smith & Wesson semiautomatic
handgun, recently purchased at Guns Galore, and started shooting. He eventually turned
the gun on himself, after firing 35 rounds in two buildings over a 2 block area. He had a
history of mental issues, and had recently been transferred to Fort Hood.
What We Learned: The After Action Review “Protecting the Force” had detailed 89
recommendations, but by Sept. .2013, only 52 had been
implemented and none included an Active Shooter Risk Assessment.
A comprehensive Active Shooter Risk Assessment has to be the first recommendation
after any Active Shooter event. Recommendations from the previous shooting were concentrated
on new policies and procedures, mental health screening, education and training programs but
those controls did not directly influence PREVENTION of incidents.
A Review of the Most Important Active Shooter controls would have been more
likely to prevent a future shooter event, like:
- Tightened Access Controls for Facilities
- Panic Alarms
- Tracking of Potential Troubled Individuals
- Metal Screening for Weapons
- Policy on Personal Weapons on Base
After the Navy Yard shooting in September 2013, another round of recommendations
were made to improve security at all DOD installations, however, a Pentagon official
said on Thursday, April 4th, that the new recommendations had not yet been put into
effect at Fort Hood. Unfortunately, at Fort Hood, very little had changed from 2009
regarding security procedures for soldiers at the entrance gates. Stay Alert and make sure that any Security Incidents are reported IMMEDIATELY!
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