An exercise on the theme of ongoing deadly violence was conducted at Thomasgymnasiet. The drill tested communication between police, rescue services, and ambulance personnel, which is considered crucial in such scenarios. Police go in first to secure areas before ambulance personnel, together with rescue services, can enter.
One of the tasks for ambulance personnel is to quickly gain access to the injured persons and quickly transport them to hospital, according to Per Ingerlund, exercise leader for ambulance personnel. In such a scenario, rescue services go in with two firefighters and one from the ambulance where one firefighter only has overall control and the other provides care together with the healthcare provider, said Jocke Karlsson, exercise leader at the rescue service. The challenge is to get a structure on what has been searched or not, including how many are the perpetrators and what kind of injuries are involved, according to Mikael Thörn.
While the exercise is ongoing at Thomasgymnasiet, the municipality practices crisis support and crisis information. In such a case, there will be a lot of focus on the acute crisis support for survivors and relatives, said Per Maniette, security chief. A nurse was shot both in the temple and the arm and died almost immediately.
She was near her usual workplace on the ground floor when a perpetrator unexpectedly struck. A language teacher together with six other people managed to barricade themselves in a classroom on the third floor. She (and perhaps one other person) 'had to give their lives' besides the total six perpetrators who could eventually be neutralized.
Anette Rydelius Sandberg, a nurse, described it as an interesting exercise but scary to hear a lot of shots, even if they were blanks. She reported that there were probably around 15 extras who were shot and injured.