New Haven Independent

The streets in front of Sound School were clogged with dozens of emergency vehicles and scores of emergency personnel — cops, firefighters, EMTs — from the city and several surrounding towns. Some students from the school had been shot, while others cowered in classrooms and SWAT teams searched frantically for hidden bombs. The only indication that this was a drill, and not a real terror attack, was the lack of noise and chaos surrounding the whole scene.

This full-scale crisis drill was staged with a half-million dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Education, written by the New Haven Public Schools Social Development Department headed by Dee Speese Linehan (in photo at right, talking to a reporter). The goal of the grant is to help the schools and the city strengthen crisis management.

Edwin Roman, 15, (pictured in the gym of a nearby school after the drill was over), is a student at Sound School who volunteered for the drill to get some community service hours toward graduation. He was inside a classroom when a SWAT team burst in.

“They told us it was a Code Red, so we all went to the corner of the classroom, away from the windows,” he said.

Was he scared, even though he knew it was just a drill?

“At first I was shocked when the SWAT team came over, because they had the big guns, the black ones. It was just crazy because they act very seriously, and it looks very real…yeah.” Then the kids were led out of the building to a safe area.

Edwin was unhurt, but his cousin Freddie Rivera, 16 (pictured at the top of the story) was shot. Everyone had tags indicating the severity of their injuries, and Speese Linehan said as the wounded were triaged, some were passed over to take the most seriously wounded first.

The scenario unfolds from two students who are expelled and come back to exact revenge on the school. They both have incendiary devices they’re planting, and they have weapons. They enter the school, shoot some people, and take hostages. One of the bombs went off and hurt some children and also ignited the chemistry lab, which then sprayed other children with chemicals for which they had to be treated for burns and flying glass.

“We had four different incidents,” Speese Linehan said, “which would tax the whole system, which is why we wanted to do it this way.” She praised the cooperation between the Board of Education, the New Haven police and fire departments, and those from surrounding towns. “It gives us all a chance to see how we’re doing,” she said.

A debriefing was scheduled with evaluators for later in the day, but those involved seemed quite pleased with how everything went. Speese Linehan did have one caveat. “I think what’s missing is the sense of urgency, because everyone knows it’s a drill. If it were the real thing, there’d be much more gnashing of teeth and screaming, and that terror would spill over into the kids’ psychological distress, which is not being addressed in a way that I’d like to see.”