Quote:
Originally Posted by James
They waited for the professionals, and 32 of them died and how many more wounded?
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I'm not sure what you're suggesting should be done -- by either people in the buildings or by first responders.
In the case of Columbine, fourteen were killed, but there were a couple thousand students and teachers in the school who were evacuated by police. I haven't seen numbers on how many were in the building at VT, but my guess is that most were rescued unharmed -- at least physically.
If they had all tried to escape through the halls, ran into the chained doors, and were trapped as a larger group, how many more might have been killed or wounded?
As it was, some were able to barricade the doors to their classrooms and may have saved their lives.
I've said before that I'm no expert, but from what I've been able to read, people who were able to hide or barricade doors (or even "play dead" in open rooms) and wait for help at both Virginia Tech and Columbine survived while most of the casualties happened in open rooms or hallways.
Some clear thinking people might be able to help themselves, but chaos and panic seldom help anything. I think that if a lot of people had tried to escape or whatever and either ran into those chained doors -- or the shooter(s) in either case -- panic would almost certainly set in. My guess is that that's why the emergency plans (especially for schools) call for lockdowns instead of evacuations until the emergency services have some kind of understanding of the situation.
Believe me, we've had a lot of those in this area post Columbine and the high school shooting in the Bailey, Colorado area last year.
The point that is well taken, though, is that the first person or several people who encounter a shooter or shooters is most likely in deep trouble.
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