GREENWOOD, Ind. — On the heels of a new report about the public safety response to the Greenwood Park Mall shooting, police and firefighters are taking action.
They held an active shooter drill at Greenwood Community High School on Thursday, using what they learned from that deadly day at the mall.
The timing of this simulation was no accident.
First responders from across Johnson County participated in realistic training on how to respond to an active shooter, including how to clear classrooms, track down a gunman, and keep kids safe.
These types of drills are common for law enforcement, but this one takes on added importance. The high school is only a few minutes and a few miles from where the mass shooting took place July 17, 2022.
"I think it's a perfect timing because it's all fresh in our minds," Greenwood Police Chief James Ison said. "We just finished our after-action report on the public safety response to that incident. A lot went right in that response, but we also learned that we had some vulnerabilities."
Those vulnerabilities were mostly logistics, including coordinating police who respond off-duty, how they're folded into the emergency, and where they park personal cars so they're not blocking any fire trucks or ambulances that need to get in and out.
Other issues they noticed they needed to shore up include where to put witnesses for questioning, staging for media and reunification for families.
In the drill, they set out to perfect the plan.
"Things that really have to be thought out and prepared for in advance so that when this type of thing actually happens, you're not caught off guard," Ison said.
Drones inside the school watched the drill.
Police officers recorded aspects of it too, to analyze their actions afterward.
The drill is meant to fine-tune a future response just months after experiencing the real thing, all with the hope it never happens again.
"We're trying to do everything just as we would in a real situation should — and hopefully it never does — but should this thing happen in Johnson County again," Ison said. "We're ready."