Behind the scenes: Lincoln terror exercise

Police, military and emergency responders said they learned lessons from terrorism attack test conducted in Lincoln overnight.

Residents around Lincoln College on Monks Road reported heard loud bangs and gun shots last night as emergency services tested their response to a terror incident in the city.

As previously reported, the roads were shut to the public as armed police, paramedics, firefighters and military personnel rushed to the scene.

Photo: Lincolnshire Police

Photo: Lincolnshire Police

The Lincolnite visited Lincolnshire Police headquarters to speak to Assistant Chief Constable Shaun West and Ian Reed from the Lincolnshire County Council Emergency Planning Service about the training exercise.

“Last night was a test of a multi agency response to a marauding terrorist firearms attack.” explained ACC Shaun West.

“The basic scenario was there were some terrorists which had taken hold of the college itself and had began issuing various threats.

“On the basis of that calls started coming into the Force Control Room and our control room then had the difficult task of trying to coordinate all of that and essentially work out where to send the resources and how to deal with the threat.”

Photo: Lincolnshire Police

Photo: Lincolnshire Police

Ian Reed added: “On an exercise of this size you always learn lessons and we’ve identified some amendments we need to make on some of our plans.

“One of the big things for us is managing social media. It’s not only managing the information, but the misinformation that happens too.

ACC Shaun West said: “It’s just that sheer volume of calls coming in, in a couple of minutes. It’s really difficult to work out what’s happening, where the terrorists are now and where we best send the resources.

“We’ve learned some really simple things like how best to improve the layout of the control room. Working out where to position the call takers, controllers and command team.”

“I’d like to thank the people that live in the surrounding areas for their patience last night.” said Ian Reed. “We did previously speak to residents through leaflet drops, but we do appreciate they may have been disturbed and we’d like to thank them for their support.”

Photo: Lincolnshire Police