Code Silver
<span>CHESTER -- An armed, masked man stepped out into a basement hallway at Memorial Hospital in Chester on Thursday morning.</span>
<span>He made his way to the office of Brett Bollmann, chief executive officer at the hospital, and shot him before continuing down the hallway, trying doors to see if they were unlocked and shooting anyone he encountered out in the open.</span>
<span>Bollmann's secretary made the "Code Silver" (active shooter) call over the intercom and a few minutes later, officers Bobby Helmers and Steve Laramore of the Chester Police Department were in pursuit of the suspect, cornering him in a lobby before shooting him.</span>
<span>This was a drill. The shooter's gun was a toy and no actual shots were fired. The officers wielded a pair of orange-tipped Airsoft rifles.</span>
<span>Plastic inflated dummies played the victims in the rampage, with each one being marked whether they were conscious or unconscious.</span>
<span>Memorial Hospital Director of Professional Services Martha Roth, who served as an observer during the drill, followed behind the shooter, who was played by Stan Gaertner.</span>
<span>"Those first three minutes are vital," said Georgia Allen, emergency management coordinator at Memorial Hospital. "Whether the staff leaves the hospital or locks their doors, it's measuring the staff response with patients and visitors."</span>
<span>Chester Police Chief Ryan Coffey also served as an observer during the drill, which was over in six minutes.</span>
<span>Coffey, Helmers, Laramore, Gaertner and hospital administrators and staff met afterwards to discuss the drill's results.</span>
<span>"I think (hospital staff) learned a lot as well," Coffey said. "They had plenty of observers and they all had some good input.</span>
<span>"We also learned how we can drill there. The next time we do it, we can incorporate some different aspects."</span>
<span>Thursday's drill was the first of its kind at Memorial Hospital, which employs 220 people.</span>
<span>"When you drill like this, it helps to reveal what your facility's capabilities are and the employees' response to an active shooter," Coffey said. "We can target certain areas, certain issues and fix those problems now and not worry about them later.</span>
<span>"For the first time doing this, I would say I'm happy with (the results)."</span>
<span>Allen said hospital staff recently took part in a 48-hour class titled "General Staff Functions in the Incident Command System" that was sponsored by the Illinois Fire Service Institute.</span>
<span>The class was designed to better prepare emergency response personnel to manage large, complex incidents effectively.</span>
<span>"It's recommended that we do so many emergency management drills a year," said Allen, who added the hospital has a "Code Adam" for infant abduction. "We do earthquake, we do tornado and we had never exercised (active shooter) before.</span>
<span>"The CPD has given us a lot of good insight and this is training for them too."</span>
<span>Allen said Gaertner, who works in the maintenance department at the hospital, has assisted staff members in different drills over the years.</span>
<span>Moving forward, Coffey said the CPD will continue to work with hospital staff on active shooter training.</span>
<span>"We're talking about offering some training similar to what we're doing with the schools, but in smaller groups," Coffey said. "Breaking it up into different departments within the hospital."</span>