By Mitch Lehman
San Marino Tribune
San Marino fire and police departments, along with three neighboring departments, underwent joint task force training Saturday in methods used to save lives in the event of an active shooter at a school or other public facility.
The SMPD and SMFD welcomed 45 participants agencies from South Pasadena, Alhambra and San Gabriel to the former campus of San Marino’s Stoneman Elementary School to the training.
“These are the people who are going to show up if we need any assistance, so it made sense to invite them to the training,” said Fire Chief Mario Rueda, who is also the acting city manager for San Marino.
The SMPD sent 12 officers and the SMFD had seven firefighters participate in the two-hour training.
“I always feel that you get a 90 just for showing up, but I also feel that this training was much needed given the number of new employees we have in the city,” said Rueda. “This was a good first step. It was a good refresher for those who had been through it and is also a first step to a good training regimen. We have a saying here: crawl, walk and then run.”
The city has two more Saturday joint task force trainings planned, with one on June 10 and the other on June 24, scheduled from 8 a.m. to noon.
During the training, groups of officers walked the perimeter of Stoneman, then responded to an “incident” near the abandoned classrooms.
Specific instructions were given to those who were playing “injured” students: two local Boy Scouts, Daniel Chen and Nathan Chan. Chen and Chan played the roles of injured schoolchildren who underwent triage at the training.
During the training, officers broke into several rescue task forces, mixing fire and police members designed to extract and treat victims.
“I think it worked out very well,” Rueda said. “This is about getting everyone on the same page. Police are charged with stopping the killing. [Firefighters] have to stop the dying. After that it is important that everyone does whatever job is needed next.”
