Police officers and civilians train in active shooter scenario

HATTIESBURG, Miss. - Local law enforcement and civilians are training with the ALICE (Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate) Institute to learn how to handle an active shooter scenario.

The two day instructor course is designed to teach proactive survival strategies for violent intruders or active shooter incidents.

ALICE Trainer, Robert Tirollo said, “Law enforcement we just can’t get there fast enough, I have been in law enforcement for 16 years, and we can’t get there fast enough, there is 1 shot fired every 4 to 15 seconds in an active shooter incident, so on the conservative end, that is 4 casualties a minute.”

Tirollo said the goal is to provide individuals with survival enhancing options for those critical moments in the gap between when a violent situation begins and when law enforcement arrives on scene.

“ALICE is kind of like wearing your seatbelt. You wear your seatbelt in the car, so that if you get into an accident, you have a better chance of survival" said Tirollo.

He added, "Well with ALICE it’s the same thing. Being trained with ALICE is not going to prevent an incident from happening, but when it happens, you can have a better chance of survival.”

A former principal, now a board member of the Federal Credit Union banks in Louisiana said its crucial to learn these skills more than ever.

“My history at least in education, is that many of the things that we are doing in schools right now are passive" said Michael Peterson."

Peterson continued, "It is a passive approach to protection for students and faculty members, and its very unfortunate that we are starting to realize that now, that is not the best case scenario, as far as approach to being safe.”

After the training officers and civilians can train those they work with the skills they gained.