Photos by Shannon Litz / Nevada AppealLeft: Tom Navin, chief of the Capitol Police, talks about the drill at the state Capitol building on Wednesday morning.
State workers in the Nevada Capitol were put to the test Wednesday in a realistic drill to see if they paid attention during training on what to do if a gunman showed up.The building went on alert at about 8:30 a.m. as a public safety officer impersonating a real gunman entered the building and started shooting blanks.Capitol Police Chief Tom Navin said he was very pleased with the results of the drill.“The purpose of the drill was to familiarize employees with bringing their training into reality should an active shooter enter the capitol,” he said.He said the workers in the different constitutional offices responded so well he believes that “no one would have been discovered by the shooter and there would have been no injuries.”All workers had received training in what to do in that type of emergency nearly a year ago but Navin said it was necessary to conduct the exercise to make sure what they were taught actually sunk in.Navin said the workers were taught to “shelter in place, to run or, as a last resort, fight.” In a real emergency, he said simply shutting and locking an office door while capitol police handle the situation is the best move, followed by fleeing out a nearby entrance away from the shooter. He said someone should fight only when clearly in danger.Throughout Wednesday’s exercise, Navin said safety was paramount and, while workers didn’t know exactly what was going to happen, they were all provided with ear plugs and checked to ensure nobody had a medical condition that could be aggravated by the noise and commotion.They also were asked whether they were carrying any weapons to make sure no one thinking the attack was real took any action that would get a participant or another worker hurt or killed.Wednesday’s exercise was the third and final in a series that began with a fire drill followed by evacuation in case of an earthquake.
