The Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) released the long-anticipated After
Action Analysis on the LAX Active Shooter Incident in 2013.
The 83-page report was written by an independent consultant who analyzed
all aspects of the Shooting incident and includes a list of “Major Observations
and Recommendations.” The recommendations are “to provide focus for
LAWA’s efforts toward continuous improvement in it’s security and emergency
preparedness programs.
These areas were highlighted in the report as “7 priority observations that merit
special consideration.
Recommendation 1.1: Evolve the LAX Security Program to reflect a more
integrated assessment of security risk and provide for the ongoing development
and management of mitigation measures.
Recommendation 1.2: Based on the RISK ASSESSMENT and updated security
plan, consider the focus and structure of security functions to determine whether
realignment and integration are needed.
Recommendation 1.3: With the benefit of recent vulnerability and risk assessments,
take a risk-based approach to evaluating current security programs and explore
intelligent use of technology.”
Once again, doing frequent Security Risk Assessments and managing the security
program and enhancements to follow the recommendations of the Risk Assess-
ment are the first recommendations in the After Action Analysis of an Active
Shooter Incident.
In my experience, in most organizations, Facility Security Risk Assessments are
not conducted correctly, are not reported to senior management, and not used as a
tool to ADJUST AND FOCUS the security program based on RISK.
Why aren’t security risk assessments done more often?
1. People don’t have the right expertise to do a full risk assessment.
2. Security managers view Security Risk Assessments are too difficult
to undertake.
3. Law enforcement personnel still do not understand the concept of risk
assessments and instead, tend to rely on checklists of controls or
security elements, rather than integrating all the information to
create a true Risk-Based model for security.
The solution to this problem is to use affordable, easy to use software tools, like
the Risk-Pro Application for Facilties Security Assessment and their Risk-Pro
Application for Active Shooter Incident to simplify the process of doing more
frequent risk assessments and using them as a management tool to focus
security so it will be able to recommend the security enhancements that are
needed, and not only how MUCH to spend, but actually dictate the order
of necessary controls.
Far from being a boring, intellectual exercise, well done security risk
assessments can dramatically reduce the possibility of an active shooter
event, and also mitigate the many negative consequences that come
from such disruptive incidents.