NFPA Journal - Summer 2023 - 6

Our 3000 World
Editor's Note by Scott Sutherland
I
n the summer of 2018, the
last time NFPA held its annual
Conference & Expo®
in Las
a cover story on NFPA 3000®
Vegas, our NFPA Journal
preview of the event included
, Standard for
an Active Shooter/Hostile Event Response
(ASHER) Program. The document had just
been issued as a provisional standard, and
there was a palpable urgency among the
safety and emergency management communities
that accompanied its arrival.
Just four months before that conference,
on Valentine's Day of 2018, 17 people, mostly
teenagers, had been killed in a shooting at
Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in
Parkland, Florida. The previous fall, in October,
2017, a gunman had killed 61 people and
wounded more than 400 at a country music
festival in Las Vegas. In a grim coincidence,
many NFPA members would first learn about
NFPA 3000 just steps from the site of the
deadliest mass shooting by an individual in
the nation's history.
Five years on, as we prepare to return to
Las Vegas, the urgency around NFPA 3000
remains. The ensuing years have been measured
by a steady drumbeat of hostile events,
most of them shootings, that have killed
hundreds and maimed and wounded many
more. According to data compiled by the Gun
Violence Archive, 336 mass shooting incidents
occurred in the United States in 2018; by 2021,
that number had risen to 690. By late April, the
number recorded so far in 2023 stood at 172.
Executive Editor, NFPA Journal
This conference preview of NFPA Journal
includes another look at NFPA 3000-but
this time it's about how a community is utilizing
the tools provided in the standard to
create a comprehensive plan to prepare for,
respond to, and recover from an incident of
mass violence.
The community is Augusta, Georgia, a
EXECUTIVE EDITOR
Scott Sutherland
ssutherland@nfpa.org
ART DIRECTION
EmDash
emdashonline.com
city of about 200,000 on the Savannah River
that is perhaps best known as the home of
Augusta National Golf Club, which annually
hosts the venerated Masters Tournament. (It
was also home to soul legends James Brown
and the much-missed Sharon Jones.) The
city began working on an NFPA 3000 plan
prior to the pandemic, and recently rekindled
those efforts with a community-wide
approach that encompasses a broad range of
stakeholders, from law enforcement to local
universities to churches and synagogues.
" Strength in Numbers, " our story on page 22,
takes an in-depth look at how that process
is working and what participants hope to
create out of their efforts. " We wanted the
community to come together to prepare for a
hostile event, not just after one for thoughts
and prayers, " says one participant.
If a random tally of hostile events shows
us anything, it's that these incidents can
occur in any community, in any setting, and
target any group of people. As the people in
Augusta make clear, their project isn't about
preventing a hostile event-it's about being
prepared should one occur. That's a first step
that any community can get behind.
THE NFPA JOURNAL MISSION It is the mission of NFPA Journal to provide NFPA members and
other stakeholders with important information on fire, electrical, and life safety topics and on issues
related to NFPA's codes and standards development, education initiatives, and advocacy efforts.
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NFPA; the meaning and intent of NFPA codes and standards can be obtained only through NFPA's
published procedures for requesting formal interpretations. The contents of this magazine may not
be reprinted without the written permission of NFPA. NFPA Journal is a registered trademark of NFPA.
6 | NFPA JOURNAL * SUMMER 2023
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NFPA Journal - Summer 2023

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