Borderline behaviour: Hands-on experience with a ‘terrorist attack’
From Wider Horizons magazine - Winter 2009
THE SCENE
In the cool morning air, rays of light from the rising sun glint off swirls of roadside dust stirred by a passing pickup truck.
Knots of people band together under and around the canopies set up over the registration tables. Uniforms mix with fatigues, denim, safety vests, and casual business attire. Snippets of chatting and a few laughs are shared over coffee and bottled water. Here and there, cell phones or walkie-talkies are pressed to ears as hurried conversations take place. Names are written down. Introductions are made. Duties are assigned.
Occasionally, a livestock vehicle pulls in to the veterinary inspection building behind the canopies – the drivers staring at what must be an unusual disturbance in their routine runs across the Montana/Alberta border.
Down by the train tracks, a truck is off-loading at the grain elevator and a few farmers stand around sharing news about how the harvest is going. It is the calm before the storm.
Operation Sweetgrass is about to ignite with a real bang, sweeping away the façade that this is just another business-as-usual day in the small Montana border town. After extensive planning and preparation, a mock terrorist event affecting both Canada and the U.S. will soon test the responses of approximately 30 different agencies from the two countries.
Front and centre on the firing line, a group of students and instructors from Lethbridge College are about to discover exactly what it means to
gain hands-on experience in a real-world situation.
THE BACKGROUND
Sponsored by the Montana Department of Military Affairs – Disaster and Emergency Services Division (MT DES) and the Montana National Guard (MT NG),
Operation Sweetgrass was an exercise conducted by the State of Montana and Alberta Emergency Management Agency. On Sept. 18, the Sweetgrass Border Port of Entry was turned into the staging grounds for an imaginary confrontation with terrorists attempting to cross the border to carry out attacks in the southern U.S.
While participants knew they were taking part in an exercise, many of the actual details were kept from them, only to unfold throughout the day. The main objectives of the exercise were to coordinate a joint response between Canada and the U.S. and demonstrate intelligence and operational information flow and coordination.
“The purpose of an exercise is to test our plans and procedures,” says Brigadier General John Walsh, the Adjutant General for the Montana National Guard. “We have an opportunity to evaluate many of the things we do well and identify those areas of operation that could be improved.”
So what were Lethbridge College students and instructors doing at the site of a planned disaster? They were doing exactly what they do best, contributing skills, enthusiasm and a quest for learning to a scenario that would enhance the knowledge base for everyone involved.
College instructors Ken Taylor, Criminal Justice (CJ), and D’Arcy Kavanagh, Communication Arts, say students played a needed and valued role in the exercise while benefiting from a unique learning opportunity.
“The CJ students played the roles of victims, witnesses and civilians,” Taylor says. “They were able to see how victims are handled and treated.”
CJ students also took on the task of playing insurgents; the suspects responsible for the incident that initiated the exercise. Jan Welk, a second-year Criminal Justice-Policing student, says the experience was very realistic and he was treated as though he was an actual insurgent.
“When we first crashed the border and were pursued by the authorities, we were pulled over and given commands on how to get out of the vehicle and what to do,” he says. “I didn’t respond exactly as ordered and ended up being yelled at.”
Taylor says this exercise provided students with a unique opportunity to encounter agencies, equipment and procedures that many never get to work with in their careers. Students also had the chance to tour the port facilities and see the equipment U.S. and Canadian border officers have at their disposal.
“Our students were able to interact with many of the agencies and discuss their roles within the justice system. It was also a good opportunity to learn about the difference in laws between the two countries.”
James Gulak, Senior Program Officer with Public Safety Canada regional office in Saskatchewan, says while the students learned from the exercise, they brought their own strengths to the event.
“No matter what roles they were playing, the students’ enthusiasm to learn by being part of the exercise was energizing for the other participants,” he says. “The level of realism they brought to the exercise made all aspects of the training as complete and accurate as possible.”
This wasn’t the first time Lethbridge College students have participated in such an exercise. In 2003 and 2004, CJ students took part in similar exercises.
Through the earlier experience, instructors and students established a positive reputation for the college resulting in the invitation to take part in this larger exercise.
Taylor says he hopes one result of Operation Sweetgrass will be a further enhancement of the college’s reputation and a resulting opportunity to build partnerships.
“Other positive outcomes that we expect are the contacts we made with the specific participating agencies.
In the past, some have come to give presentations at Lethbridge College and others have provided material to keep instructors current,” he says.
While CJ students have been involved in the past, the Sweetgrass exercise was a first for Communication Arts students, Kavanagh says.
The Print and Broadcast Journalism students took on the role of media responding to the disaster.
Larry Overcast, area port director for the Sweetgrass Border Port of Entry, says the Communication Arts students added a dimension of realism to the exercise, demonstrating the need for agencies to be prepared to share available information in a timely manner.
“The media students were a fantastic addition. It gave our people who were assigned the role of public information officers an opportunity to deal with a media response to a complex event as it was unfolding,” he says. “The issue of media direction and containment to ensure safety and fairness in availability to all was another valuable challenge for us.”
James Richardson, Critical Infrastructure Protection Analyst with the Public Safety Canada regional office in Edmonton, agrees having the Communication Arts students enhanced the entire exercise.
“They definitely provided a sense of realism in how the media would approach an event like this. We couldn’t have had a more accurate simulation of the real thing,” he says. “Their presence allowed for other participants to do their jobs while seeing what it would be like to have the media on hand.”
Kavanagh says the students benefited from seeing how various agencies work together in emergency situations, gaining insights into what they can expect as they pursue careers in the media. This included writing at the scene to meet tight deadlines, capturing images and video to transmit to colleagues back at the college, interviewing agency representatives and offering a very real media scrum experience for agency representatives assigned to provide information about the unfolding disaster.
“Our students came away with a better understanding of how they need to function to cover such an event with speed and accuracy,” he says. “It was an invaluable experience and I expect it’ll be an event they will remember long after they graduate from Lethbridge College.”
Second-year Broadcast Journalism student Quinn Ohler agrees, saying it’s better to learn how to respond to disasters in a mock event than the real thing.
“It gave me the hands-on experience I needed to handle a disaster situation in the real world,” she said. “It could be years before you ever experience it, but it’s important to know how to respond.”
THE SCENE II
Tension slowly builds as the zero hour approaches. Those gathered for the exercise don’t know exactly what to expect. The sun is promising higher temperatures to come. People mill about, anxious to get under way. Another cattle truck pulls into the yard . . . and it happens.
Down by the train track a loud ‘bang’ draws everyone’s attention. Minutes pass and a second blast is heard. Plumes of yellow smoke billow from the site of the explosion, close to the border crossing.
An unsuspecting civilian hurriedly flees from the scene, adding a sense of unexpected realism.
The first emergency calls come in and Operation Sweetgrass is underway.
Events escalate as first responders find bodies lying next to the track, and then succumb to what eventually proves to be a toxic nerve agent. To the east, a second group of insurgents is nabbed in a truck after entering Montana at the Whitlash border crossing. A container of the gas is found in the back of the truck. National Guard vehicles arrive in Sweetgrass. Helicopters circle overhead. A line of unmarked black SUVs rolls onto the site.
College CJ students are dropping from the affects of the ‘gases’ released in the blast. Miraculously, the ‘dead’ rise after a scene is cleared to once again walk the earth as, perhaps, a fresh injured victim.
Communication Arts students scramble to report on the disaster, capturing images for print and broadcast and interviewing on the scene. It’s a little too realistic for some emergency responders who have to break character to ask if the college reporters are students or the ‘real’ media.
CJ students have endured 30 C as victims lying in the hot sun, been nabbed as terrorist suspects and had great opportunities to learn from agency experts.
Communication Arts students have raced from disaster scene to multiple media conferences and on to their temporary headquarters to produce stories for print and broadcast.
It’s been a day that has provided the kind of hands-on experience of which most students can only dream; a once in a lifetime opportunity to contribute to an international exercise while gaining insights that will help form a career.
Student Perspectives
Kinga Santa
Criminal Justice - Policing
When Ann Parks first asked me to take part in this National Exercise Program I was a little hesitant, not knowing exactly what it was I would be doing. I was not sure if I really wanted to miss a full day’s worth of classes.
I was lucky enough to work hand-in-hand with three other students from Lethbridge College at the registry station where we helped organize and start the day’s events. Since we were not assigned to act in any roles as terrorists, emergency crews, military officials or media, we were able to observe and take part in every scenario of the exercise.
As a Criminal Justice – Policing student I was able to follow the police in the exercise and relate my studies with the way they conducted their work in such an event.
It was amazing to see all the steps and levels that are involved in dealing with the complications and issues of such events.
When I am in class sometimes I wonder, “Why do I need to learn this if I am in Policing?” In this particular event, classes such as English, Sociology and Ethics & Interpersonal Skills played more of a significant role than courses such as Law or Criminalistics that we seem to sometimes take more seriously.
Having also been able to spend time with the military officials and emergency crews, we got to take part in tours of on-site command centres, and laboratories where they kindly educated and demonstrated the use of many pieces of equipment, radios, satellites, and safety uniforms that would be used on site in an event such as the one we were taking part in. At the end of the day, after spending time with all these different people and observing their roles, I was able to confirm my own personal career choice.
Overall, I believe Operation Sweetgrass was a successful exercise. It was great to see both sides of the border were able to set aside any differences and work together in such a respectful manner in order to achieve their common goals. The students of Lethbridge College should be very proud and honoured that we have been asked to take part in this exercise more than once now; this says a great deal not only about our students but all faculty members that help make these opportunities possible for us to be a part of.
Scott Schmidt
Communication Arts – Print Journalism
The sound of the explosion rang through my head so fast I could hardly register how loud it was.
Then yellow smoke began to billow around the train car almost immediately, at first so dense and bright it was almost beautiful.
But when the mass grew, its beauty faded as the suffocating cloud began to consume everyone around it.
My first thought was to get the best photograph possible. With only the U.S. Army blocking my way, I laid facedown underneath a train to steal some shots of a dead woman. I figured those men in camouflage wouldn’t mind; they looked pre-occupied with the expanding mist that was now engulfing them as well.
My second thought was that this is the last thing I’m ever going to do; this canary cloud is clearly toxic and I’m going to die.
When one of the men told me it might be dangerous to lie under a working train during the exercise, I snapped out of my reverie.
Exercise?
Organizers had taken such care in this so-called exercise, that I had to convince myself I wasn’t filling my lungs with deadly chlorine fumes. In fact, I was front row as the U.S. government played the biggest game of cops and robbers I had ever seen.
They were playing terrorist attack.
On Sept. 18, while the U.S. and Canadian governments were executing a 33-agency training exercise in Sweetgrass, Mont., finding reality was an exhausting task, but it was also my job.
As one of 30 Lethbridge College Communication Arts students involved, my duty was to pretend every single minute of the day was really happening, and drill everyone I could find for vital information.
What was that cloud? How many are dead? Are any suspects known or in custody? Was it a terrorist attack? What’s the next step?
Drill them, I did. I figured, if the government wanted a realistic practice session, it was going to get one.
Today, I am not a second-year college student, I am the public’s only link to information that could save their lives, and these folks in uniform are going to give it to me.
We surrounded government officials hourly, torturing them for information updates, then sprinted to media headquarters to transform facts into copy and get them on the Internet for the public, before racing back to the next mauling.
Part of disaster control is handling the media, and in a situation such as this, the media swarm would be unimaginable. I would like to think my part in Operation Sweetgrass strengthened the capabilities of our governments.
I just hope unnecessarily so.