Another mass murder has attempted to threaten our country’s security. A Lone Wolf gunman entered an Aurora, Colorado movie theatre and reportedly shot more than 50 people — killing twelve. This Lone Wolf entered the theatre through an exit door, stood near the screen, threw two canisters across the theatre and started shooting.
Moviegoers began to flee from the shooter and what they thought was “gas” coming from the canisters.
However, it’s being reported by officials that a chemical smoke was dispersed from the canisters.
The Fog of War
Chemical smoke and gas can be a battlefield problem for the first responder. If our vision is obscured or our breathing is labored, our effort to stop the active shooter and rescue victims will be difficult. The gunman in the Aurora incident was taken into custody in the parking lot outdoors, so the chemical smoke inside was most likely not a problem for first responders there.
However, copycats and terrorists are gaining intelligence from this event, so prepare your self to see this battle tactic again.
Lone Wolves and terrorists can use chemical smoke and gas to their advantage and uniformed first responders need to understand how to safely respond to combat environments where they have been deployed. Obviously in a gas munitions environment your protective mask will need to be utilized and it will afford protection during the operation. However, the focus here is on the use of chemical smoke which can be a greater tactical challenge.
Chemical munitions such as smoke are used for a variety of reasons in law enforcement and in the military. Police use chemical smoke in mostly in crowd control however, tactical units will use smoke to obscure a tactical movement, float chemical munitions, mark medic evacuation operations, verify wind speed and direction, distraction and psychological operations.
Chemical smoke will have a very slight sweet odor. OSHA has designated many law enforcement smoke products to be non-hazardous and non-carcinogenic, as long as it is used outdoors. However, a real danger exists with the use of chemical smoke indoors.
Smoke will displace oxygen at a quicker rate than CN, CS, and OC munitions. Smoke munitions used indoors may cause chlorine pneumonia and has caused more deaths in the United States than the other chemicals due to its improper usage. Therefore, venting an objective where smoke munitions have been deployed is critical prior to responding to neutralize your adversary. This can be achieved by propping doors open as you respond into the stronghold. Tactical officers keep rubber door wedges in their vests, which wedge between the floor and door base to keep doors open as they clear an objective. You can purchase these wedges for less than a dollar and I recommend keeping a half a dozen in your “go-bag.”
Larger areas like malls — or large movie theatres — may have the ability to vent themselves depending on the amount of smoke deployed and the buildings ventilation system.
Keep in mind that a gas mask will not provide oxygen in a chemical smoke environment!
Chemical smoke munitions come in a variety of colors for law enforcement and the military. The most widely used is the color white and other colors include red, green, yellow, blue, violet, and black. Chemical smoke munitions can cause irritation to the eyes and respiratory system, dizziness and sensory deprivation.
A Hodgepodge of Hazards
Chemical smoke munitions are also a fire hazard and should not be deployed onto rooftops, crawl spaces or indoors. The first responder going into an active shooter event may want to grab the portable fire extinguisher from the trunk of the cruiser and place it at the door of the building (or somewhere close where you can grab it), if it becomes necessary to fight a small fire while saving a victim or during an officer rescue operation.
Be mindful that most firefighters won’t respond to a fire if there is a threat of an active shooter inside the objective. Many fires have been started by tactical teams using gas inside buildings, and chemical smoke is just as dangerous, so don’t hesitate to be prepared to extinguish a small fire.
Chemical smoke may develop fear or anxiety due to lack of visibility. This can cause orientation difficulties and can isolate individuals as well as groups, degrading their ability to fight. Officers in this situation are vulnerable to deception through other sensory perceptions such as sound and you can suffer mental exhaustion in a short time.
Immediate physiological effects to extended exposure to large concentrations of chemical smoke may produce secondary effects such as shortness of breath, inflammation of the respiratory system, dizziness, vertigo, and vomiting. Because of this, the military requires troops to be masked whenever they are exposed to smoke. Simply leaving the smoke area and sitting on the ground may overcome vertigo.
Chemical munitions such as CS, CN and OC may also be delivered with smoke. Therefore, it is wise to mask when chemical smoke is present. Your agency should have issued you a mask and it should be in your “go-bag,” but if not, it may be good to find an intersection to direct traffic while the properly-prepared officers handle the emergency.
Moving Through Smoke
The first responder’s primary objective is to make contact with the active shooter and stop his actions. Forming a contact team is the preferred method if it can be done quickly otherwise a solo response will be necessary.
Moving through the smoke is tough. You will navigate the stronghold as a blind man in your attempt to locate the shooter. A solo first responder will have to be able to move and identify the shooter, discriminating him from innocent persons.
If you can form a contact team I suggest you form a wedge, much like a “V” formation of flying geese. Each man has to stay in sight of just the man in front of him, typically an arms length away as they move. He then must provide fire cover to his left or right side depending on which side of the “V” formation he is on. The point man will try to navigate the formation to the shooter based on intel from dispatch, intel from fleeing victims, and noises he hears.
Another important factor moving through chemical smoke with a formation is you must have a tight perimeter around the smoked area and the stronghold because the formation may not encounter the shooter but they will most likely flush him out of the smoked area and officers must be ready to intercept. A diamond formation may be used in this manner but since the formation is much smaller it is a more dangerous option.
When you locate your active shooter in a chemical smoke environment remember there could be innocent people in close proximity. Therefore a “contact” shot to the head is a safer option to help minimize the possibility of other persons that you can’t see getting injured.
A couple points to consider (which I don’t have the time to discuss in detail here) are:
• The Aurora active shooter was wearing body armor, so take headshots (and train for it!)
• Prepare for the unexpected and carry a weapon — with extra ammunition — off duty
One last thing — and this is important. Thee tragedy in that Aurora movie theatre had around 70 total victims, so be prepared to utilize your combat casualty care tactics to help EMS treat victims. Any EMS responding to this tragedy would likely be overwhelmed — as a matter of fact, in some metro areas EMS responding to a single gunshot victim takes 20 minutes to respond.
Can you live with yourself if you’re not prepared to treat a teen-age gunshot victim and he or she ends up dying? Get some Tactical Life Saver training or at least educate yourself, as there are plenty of resources out there to read.
Stay safe!
