TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTWO/WAWV) — In a week that started off with a mass shooting in Muncie, the Terre Haute Police Department spent the week training up for these types of emergencies.
At the end of the week, 115 THPD officers will have completed the annual active shooter training, while members of the Specail Response Team train monthly.
This year’s training took place at the Meadows school building. The training gives officers experience in clearing hallways and classrooms. Sergeant Justin Sears said they rotate locations throughout the years to put officers into several local scenes.
“Our instructors look over active shooter events from across the nation. And we analyze those, we look at trends and during this training, we try to replicate that as best as we can,” Sears said. “And then we put our officers through that.”
Sears also said the hands-on training and experience is important, “This has to be hands-on, it has to be physical and has to be some kind of force on force.”
The experience gives officers the opportunity to experience situations they hope to not come in contact with but is important work.
“If you don’t get the repetitions when you get into a serious situation like this, your senses start being overloaded, if you haven’t been exposed to it before you might start getting tunnel vision, just little things like that. So, when we create this life-like scenario, it’ll make it that much easier if it, God forbid, were to happen.”
