By Hannah Gordon
News Editor
St. Bonaventure hasn’t executed a formal lockdown drill since 2009, but Safety and Security said one isn’t necessary.*
In 2008, Rick Trietley, vice president for student affairs, established the first formal emergency structure on campus, drafting drill plans and developing a relationship with the Cattaraugus Country Police Department, according to Vito Czyz, director of Safety and Security.
In 2009, an active-shooter exercise was executed, and the campus was shut down for almost an entire day, Czyz said.
Since Czyz became director of safety and security in 2010, there has not been a lockdown. Czyz said an active-shooter threat was ranked sixth on a scale of most probable and largest impact.
“We took a look at all the different threats that might happen at St. Bonaventure, and my team ranked them,” Czyz said. “An active shooter didn’t even rank as the highest because what we look at is impact and probability of the event happening. As far as ranking, we looked at human impact, university impact and facility impact, and that’s what we based our exercise and drill plan on.”
Ranking above active-shooter was snow or ice storm, tornado or high winds, residential building fire, power failure and telecommunications system failure, in that order. Ranking lowest on the list was mudslide, landslide and tsunami.
In 2010, simulation of a lockdown drill was executed. In 2011, a “Bona Burn” was done to simulate a burning dorm room. In 2013, two suspicious package reports were responded to, and a large-scale hazmat spill was simulated. Thus far in 2014, a suspicious package exercise was conducted.
“There’s more to this than just lockdown,” Czyz said. “We didn’t want to spend all of our time on just lockdown drills. We were heavy on lockdowns from 2009-2012, and we’ve done drills every semester, just not lockdown drills every semester. “
According to Ralph Aloia, fire and life safety officer, a total of four drills per year are held in each residence hall and three in educational or business buildings, totaling 35 buildings.
“We do (a drill) the first few weeks of school in all the buildings, two more drills and a random drill in the spring,” Aloia said.
Safety and Security works closely with the Allegany Fire Department and allows them to perform extraction and fog machine drills on campus, so they are familiar with buildings, according to Aloia.
“In working closely with our State Marshal Inspector, I can say student and community safety gets much attention,” Aloia said.
Czyz said he’s confident in the alert system for campus, E2 Campus Text.
“I can login no matter where I am if there is an emergency and send out an E2 Campus Text alert,” Czyz said. “I created a few templates for possible scenarios, including active shooter, so I don’t have to think about what’s going on. I can just click the template, fill in the blanks and send it out.”
Czyz said the attitude toward lockdown responses is changing.
“It’s not just lockdown anymore, now it’s run, hide and fight,” Czyz said. “If it’s safe, you take off in the opposite direction. If it’s not safe, then you lockdown in a room. The last concept is the fight concept. If the guy is breaking down the door, then do everything you can to keep him out and be prepared with a weapon.”
Before the Sandy Hook school shooting in Dec. 2012, the lockdown procedure was never questioned, according to Czyz. The mentality was that active shooter wouldn’t waste time to break into rooms, Czyz said.
“If you’re an active shooter, you know that you only have 10-15 minutes before your life is over,” Czyz said. “You’re not going to wait and try to break down a door. But with Sandy Hook, and now with the use of automatic weapons, (shooters) can shoot right through the doors with no problem. A lock and key won’t help much with a fully automatic weapon.”
Czyz said despite this frightening reality, the campus is very prepared. New York State officials planned to be on campus on Nov. 18 for a program called “Citizens Emergency Preparedness Training.” Free backpacks filled with emergency kits will be given out to the limited attendees.
“You can never be 100 percent prepared, but we know what we have to do. The security departments job is facilitating a police response,” Czyz said. “We could
be more prepared by having more discussion about it, but the key is the first one to five minutes of the incident that you have to do the right thing. You don’t have the information beforehand.”
*This was a reporting mistake. Security did not say a formal lockdown drill was unnecessary.
