On April 16th, 2007, Seung-Hui Cho shot and killed two students in a dormitory room at Virginia Tech University. Two hours and 20 minutes later, Cho entered the Norris Hall engineering building. He then systematically assaulted five rooms on the second floor. In his wake, he left 30 students and professors murdered, and an additional 24 victims injured. Within minutes, officers from Virginia Tech P.D. and Blacksburg P.D. entered Norris Hall and forced Cho to take his own life.
SWAT teams assemble outside Norris Hall on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Va., Monday, April 16, 2007. A gunman opened fire in a Virginia Tech dorm and then, two hours later, in a classroom across campus Monday, killing 30 people. (AP Photo/The Roanoke Times, Eric Brady) |
Cho began planning and training for his attack in February 2007. He purchased a .22 caliber Walther P-22 handgun over the Internet and in March 2007 he purchased a 9mm Glock from a licensed dealer. Later that month, Cho purchased two extra magazines for the Walther and three extra magazines for the Glock on the internet. He also purchased additional ammunition, magazines, a hunting knife, several chains, four padlocks, and a multi pocket fishing vest. Cho would visit local gun ranges and a national forest shooting range to practice his shooting skills. He also started an intense workout program, which included a weight lifting regimen.
The morning of the massacre Cho shoots and kills his first two victims between 0702 and 0715 in a dormitory on the Virginia Tech campus and flees. At 0720 Virginia Tech police are notified that a female may have fallen from her dorm room bed and a rescue squad was dispatched. Shortly after VTPD respond and by 0730 the crime scene is secured and VTPD begins its investigation into the suspected homicide. VTPD and Blacksburg Police Department ERT officers begin to arrive at approximately 0815 and stage in different areas to assist in a warrant service or to make an arrest of the unknown suspect(s).
At approximately 0901, Cho mails a package to NBC news in New York from the Blacksburg Post Office. The package contains his manifesto, 43 photos of himself and a DVD of himself. He alludes to a “coming massacre” and expresses he wants to “get even” with his “oppressors.”
Construction workers outside of Norris Hall between 0915 and 0930 witness Cho. He then chains and padlocks all three doors to Norris Hall. A building maintenance worker discovers a note on the east breezeway doors stating, “If the chains are removed a bomb will go off.” The worker took the note to a Dean’s office and they were allegedly about to call the police when the shooting started.
Between 0941 and 0942 Cho begins his assault on Norris Hall shooting professors and students. The first 911 call reaches VTPD at 0942. At 0945 Officers from BPD and VTPD arrive at Norris Hall. They form up into three separate teams and plan on making entry at three different points of Norris Hall. They hear what appear to be shots fired while attempting to gain entry. They discover that all three doors at their entry points have been chain locked from the interior. A couple attempts at shooting the locks off with a shotgun fail but at 0950 VTPD officers breach a door with a shotgun that leads into a machine shop. The two entry teams enter the machine shop and are now inside the shooters stronghold.
The two entry team commanders determine the gunshots are coming from the second floor. One-team races up a stairway on the west side and another team races down the first floor hallway until they get to the south stairway and they proceed up to the second floor. Both teams are shouting “Police” as they maneuver up the staircase. The two teams now have Cho flanked and he is caught between them.
Cho shoots one last victim then turns the gun on himself and takes his own life. From the time the teams breach the Machine shop doors and get positioned on the second floor only 28 seconds pass.
At this point, the two teams are unaware that Cho has killed himself. Nor do they know how many gunmen there are. The gunshots have stopped and the team leaders fear the gunman may have taken a hostage or are planning to ambush the entry teams. The third entry team element now links up with one of the two entry teams on the second floor. They clear and secure as they move.
A student in the room where Cho is calls 911 at 1008 and advises the dispatcher that Cho is dead and his location. The two teams now receive info from dispatch where the gunman(s) location is but not that he is dead. They immediately close in on that classroom and discover the door is blocked from inside with two of the victims bodies lying against the door. One of the team leaders instructs anybody inside the classroom that can open the door to do so. The only two people not shot in that classroom open the door and the entry teams discover Cho is dead and advise that the shooter is down. The building is then completely cleared in case of multiple threats. Also, a massive evacuation of the wounded from the officers inside the building begins.
The entire shooting rampage is estimated to have occurred within eleven minutes. From the time the first 911 call was received from Norris Hall to the time Cho kills himself fewer than nine minutes will pass. Once the officers arrived at Norris Hall and make entry into the building, less than five minutes will pass. Once entry was gained and the team moves to the sound of shots fired and reach the second floor twenty-eight seconds will pass. Cho takes his own life within two minutes of the Machine Shop door being breached.
In that time, Cho fires 174 rounds of 9mm and .22, 17 magazines were found empty or partially empty and an additional 203 rounds were found in his backpack. Cho murders 30 people and injuries another 27 in Norris Hall.
It should be noted that the second floor has seven classrooms and four of those classrooms Cho breached and murdered innocent students. The doors on the second floor opened inward and had no windows.
So what tactical points must we consider for future active shooter responses?
(1) We must train for an active shooter incident or a terrorist event with other agencies that may respond to a critical incident in your jurisdiction. Blacksburg P.D. and Virginia Tech P.D.’s did and that was critical to their success.
(2) Breaching gear and training is crucial to have for SWAT and Patrol. Your departments must have several breaching options available, including shotgun breaching, breaching packs and explosive breaching. The shotgun breaching allowed the teams to make entry in the Machine Shop at Virginia Tech. Does your department have one or more of those options available to you?
(3) Get training to use your patrol car as a breaching tool. A simple slow push from the front of any roller will push in the doorframe of most buildings. Once inside turn on your sirens and lights to provide a safe passage for fleeing victims and it will alert the shooter that you’re inside and on the way to neutralize him. If your making a single man entry, this buys you time to gather intelligence and wait for back up while standing ready using the car for limited cover. Remember as soon as Cho knew that the police were in the building he decided to kill himself. If your entry makes him go to ground either by suicide, barricading him self or hiding then he has stopped the killing. That is your objective.
(4) Move to the shooter and bring him to ground quickly to eliminate the threat.
(5) Stay tactical throughout your movement. The teams inside Norris Hall maintained cover for their movements and cleared rooms as they closed ground on the shooter.
(6) Get one or more tactical medics on your team or in patrol. Both tactical teams in Norris Hall had tactical medics and every wounded victim that was evacuated from Norris Hall lived. There are no reasons why a patrolman or SWAT operator can’t be trained in Tactical Combat Casualty Care. How many times do police officers get injured or shot and E.M.S is minutes away? This valuable training will help officers quickly access a victims injuries which will expedite your teams movement or save an officers life.
(7) The Blacksburg and Virginia Tech tactical teams were already assembled and standing by on the campus or at BPD headquarters (which is approximately a mile away from Norris Hall) due to the initial two homicides at the dorm. If Cho had assaulted Norris Hall first, the response from the police departments would have been different. The response time would have been greater. Swat commanders and Tactical officers need to help prepare patrol for a quick tactical response.
(8) Terrorist organizations around the world most likely watched this response and will use the same intelligence we have access to in the U.S. against us. Remember, we are tasked with responding to all active shooter and terrorist events in this country not the military. When they come they will be have more people, larger weapons, better trained and a better plan than Cho. Also they are more likely to fight to the death as opposed to committing suicide.
Unfortunately, this type of attack will most likely occur again in the United States. Are you prepared to fight for our children? Is your department giving you the training and equipment needed to respond to such an event? If you don’t adequately train, prepare, and respond to a “Virginia Tech” type of incident, then monsters like Cho will continue to kill our children.
The Blacksburg and Virginia Tech police officers did an outstanding job responding to a complex tactical problem.
Follow their lead and prepare for the worst, properly train and equip your officers to fight like Warriors!
Related Va. Tech resources:
Virginia Tech massacre one year later, 33 dead remembered
Va. Tech led schools to re-evaluate policies
Lessons learned at Virginia Tech shooting
Why we won’t learn from Virginia Tech: The problem with hindsight bias
Revisiting Va. Tech: 8 minutes after 911 call, a rescue from madness
Experts weigh in on active shooter policies: 5-minute delay crucial in Va. Tech shooting
Virginia Tech massacre: Where do we go from here?
