Supervisors at the 911 Operations Center in Nova Scotia in April 2020 say major changes have prepared them better for such a crisis, but the trauma of the event has halved their workforce and forced them to fight.
Brian Green and Kirsten Bagley, who were supervisors at the Biblical Hill Operational Communication Center (OCC) during the massacre, spoke to the Commission on Mass Victims, which is investigating Monday’s tragedy.
Green said that at the time of the killings on April 18-19, 2020, there were 50 full-time operators, and now there are only 24. People who are on long-term sick leave still hold some positions, Green said. but they may or may not return.
“The scale of this was more than any of us could have imagined,” Bagley said.
“We lost great operators, great employees, great people I wouldn’t think we would lose,” Green added.
Green said the center is still feeling the excitement of the event, as it recently lost some employees who behaved “as best they could” this April.
Brian Green and Kirsten Bagley, both camera-facing commanders at the RCMP Operations Communication Center, testified Monday. (Andrew Vaughn / Canadian Press)
The center is trying to rebuild staff, “but it’s hard to handle, so we’re struggling,” Green said.
The inquiry heard that the OCC is where 911 RCMP callers and dispatchers work and where the RCMP risk manager is located. The center was located in Bible Hill at the time of the mass shooting, but moved to RCMP headquarters in Dartmouth last year.
Green and Bagley described what they experienced when they came to work on the morning of April 19, unaware of how an armed man attacked his partner, killed several neighbors in Portapik while disguised as a police officer, and set fire to houses. before running away from the community the night before.
The OCC supervisor at night and the risk manager briefed him on what was happening and the ongoing search for the shooter around 6:30 a.m., Green said, remembering wondering, “How is this real?”
Bagley offered to help take calls to the office, but due to early precautions against COVID-19, she said they are allocating staff and there is room for only seven callers working this morning. She added that there were five dispatchers on the other side of the wall and often ran back and forth to deliver messages that day.
Although Green believed for the first few hours that the incident was over and that the shooter would eventually be found in Portapic, he followed their policies for an active shooter and helped update the team arriving this morning. But then he said things escalated shortly after 9:30 a.m. when news of a new victim of the Wentworth shooting came.
The Nova Scotia RCMP Operational Communication Center shown in this photo file received 911 calls. In April 2020, dispatchers worked in Truro, NS (Nova Scotia RCMP)
Over the next two hours, the shooter killed many more times, including strangers and acquaintances, as he drove through the countryside in his fake police cruiser and stolen vehicles.
Operators were so busy focusing on incoming calls with vital information – Green said at one point 80 calls were processed in half an hour – that he and Baglee got involved to call other police agencies or emergency medical services. assistance (EHS) and coordinated air support.
He added that callers are so busy that they have sometimes been forced to shut people down if the caller does not have new and urgent information.
“Someone described it as turning on a fire hydrant, it just exploded. The very fact that they kept the information clear was a miracle. “I feel like we held 99.9 percent of her rights and made sure she got to the people who needed it,” Green said.
While police were on the road chasing the shooter, Green and Bagley said they were doing the same thing within the OCC and trying to find a model that could point him in the right direction.
Information comes with every scene
One of the hardest things was knowing that the only way information about the shooter came was because “something terrible” had happened, Green said, and the police always looked about 30 seconds behind him.
At one point, Bagley said the risk manager, a staff sergeant. Bruce Briars asked her to call the Truro police and tell them to lock up their town so they could be prepared in case their shooter came.
The investigation heard a call from Bagley, which entered Truro’s forces at 10:37 a.m., by which time the gunman had already passed through the city center.
Truro Police Insp. Darin Smith said in an interview with a committee that he did not have enough information about the blockades, including where the armed man might come from, and said the direction was a “panic statement” sent to the dispatcher without real intent.
But Bagley said she had given Truro’s staff all the information she knew, and it was not her job to instruct any police agency on what to do next.
“If you have a blocking protocol, then I would think it’s time to start this,” Bagley said.
Shortly after this call to Truro, it became clear that the shooter was in Shubenakadie as RCMP Const. Chad Morrison said on the radio that he was shot by the attacker at 10:48 a.m.
Within minutes, const. Heidi Stevenson turned onto a nearby highway ramp and collided head-on with a fake cruiser of an armed man, eventually being shot and killed in a shootout.
“When Heidi was killed, she just felt the air leave the room for about half a second, and then we just kept going, as if it hadn’t happened. I had to, ”Green said.
Both Green and Bagley said that not being able to react emotionally and dealing with anything was one of the worst aspects of working at the OCC that day, including hearing Morrison begging for help as he hid behind EHS depot, bleeding badly.
“We want to protect our members. It’s our job, it’s to take care of them, to make sure they get home – and we couldn’t, “Bagley said, her voice cracking as she burst into tears.
“This is our worst day, our worst nightmare is coming true.”
Kirsten Bagley, acting commander of the RCMP’s operational communications center, testified in an investigation by the Mass Victims Commission on Monday. She testified that due to COVID-19’s distancing requirements, she spent April 19 running back and forth delivering messages to center staff. (Andrew Vaughn / Canadian Press)
The inquiry heard how key information broadcast on police radio stations and called to the OCC from the early hours of the Portapice response had either not been heard or passed on to commanders.
But part of this interruption may be related to employees who misuse their radios or do not properly attract the dispatcher’s attention, as other experts and RCMP members recently said in the inquiry.
Green said Monday that it’s important for the public to realize that employees did their best in the two days with the setup and technology they had at the time, and it’s very easy to miss details when stress is high and so much is happening .
People working on the April 19th shift took the next eight days off, while the April 18 shift had five days off, supervisors said. While Green said she felt her peer support and connections with psychologists were enough, given that so many people have left work or are still ill, more help may be needed.
“Moncton told us that people were evicted in a month, and that’s not necessarily a good idea, but again, I don’t know if five or eight days are enough,” Green said.
“I feel I had adequate support, but if you ask someone else, I don’t know what they will answer – but whatever they answer is the right answer.
Twenty-two people died on April 18 and 19, 2020. Top row left: Gina Gulet, Dawn Gulenchin, Jolin Oliver, Frank Gulenchin, Sean McLeod, Alana Jenkins. Second row: John Hall, Lisa McCully, Joey Weber, Heidi Stevenson, Heather O’Brien and Jamie Blair. Third row from the top: Kristen Beaton, Lillian Campbell, Joan Thomas, Peter Bond, Tom Bagley and Greg Blair. Bottom line: Emily Tuck, Joy Bond, Corey Ellison and Aaron Tuck. (CBC)
After the mass shooting, both supervisors said dozens of changes have been made to the OCC, including a new setup in which both callers and dispatchers are in a large open space and risk managers are on a raised platform in the middle to be able to I see and hear everything.
Policies over critical incidents and alarms have also changed, and Green said he already has technology and resources he would not have wanted during the mass shooting.
During a recent major incident, Green said she felt the event was much smoother and the answer was “more accurate.”
Both supervisors said criticism from Nova Scotia and the media was difficult for them and their staff, so they both wanted to explain their side of what happened during those two days.
“I did not want to be another transcript. I wanted the OCC to be represented as people, as people, “Bagley said.
“We did our best that day. We pulled all the stops.”
The investigation will resume on Tuesday, when other agencies involved in the response and local politicians are expected to take part in more discussions.
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