NITRO, W.Va. — Area law enforcement are coming together to learn how to effectively break down doors in an event of an active shooter situation.
The Nitro, St. Albans, and Dunbar Police Department’s SWAT team had the opportunity to conduct active shooter and breach training in the former Nitro High School Tuesday.
A lieutenant with the Nitro Police Department, Justin Raynes said the large swinging doors in the building make for an ideal training ground.
“The doors in a school are not like doors in a residential house, they’re usually outward swinging, they’re heavy, strong doors, they’re in a recess so you’re usually operating in a small space, it’s not as simple as just running up and hitting them with a ram or anything like that” said Raynes.
He said it takes a lot of effort and working knowledge to get through these kinds of doors and to do it quickly.
At Tuesday’s training they not only were testing out battering rams to get through the doors, but sledge hammers, chainsaws, breaching rounds, and other tools that would effectively get the job done.
Raynes said the training gives them the opportunity to work the types of doors characteristic to where active shooter scenarios often occur.
“Unfortunately we often see the news pretty commonly with school shootings, active shootings, and these are not happening most of the time at residential places, they’re schools or places of worship, or places with heavy duty doors,” he said.
He said it’s working knowledge the officers...
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