The mass shooting that occurred earlier this week during a country music concert on the Las Vegas Strip which left more than 50 people dead and over 500 others injured will likely serve as a game-changing incident for the security industry, experts say. While the massacre has raised many questions about hotel security given that the gunman, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, was able to amass an arsenal of weapons in his room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay resort, it will also undoubtedly spur significant changes in how stadiums and open-air venues, in particular, are secured moving forward.
The desire of terrorists to strike large venues is certainly not a secret, but the way in which they approach these targets now – trying to attack people as they enter or leave an event – has forced stadium operators to rethink where their event perimeters begin and end.
In May, 23 people were killed and 250 were injured following the detonation of a bomb outside Manchester Arena in the UK. The victims were all in the process of filing out of the arena following an Ariana Grande concert. Additionally, during the Paris terror attacks in 2015, a terrorist bomber sought to make his way into the Stade de France stadium during a soccer match between Germany and France but later blew himself up outside the venue after he was turned away by security.
A ‘Watershed’ Moment for Security
According to Dr. Lou Marciani, director of the National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security (NCS4) at the University of Southern Mississippi, the Las Vegas massacre, now the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history, has introduced yet another paradigm into event security to include mitigating attacks that could be launched from nearby high-rise buildings.
“I think this is a watershed moment for all of us (in security),” he says. “This is a different paradigm and set of rules (by the attacker) in the sense of looking at events, particularly outdoor events, from the perspective or risk and vulnerability assessment. It has changed the way we have to think.”
Event and stadium security expert Dan Donovan, who serves as vice president of security and technology consulting at Guidepost Solutions, says that event organizers in the wake of this shooting are going to have to re-evaluate their security perimeters as well as what they may need to address from a counter-surveillance perspective. “Really, it is going to be about how do they partner with law enforcement and better understand the risks that are well outside their perimeter,” he says.
Richard Morman, the former deputy chief of police at Ohio State University and the president and CEO of security consulting firm Concentric Risk Solutions, says that just after 9/11, event promoters, industry organizations and law enforcement did a good job of collaborating and sharing intelligence on potential threats and have continued that in the years since. However, this shooting and other recent incidents, such as the aforementioned bombing in Manchester as well as the numerous vehicle ramming attacks that occurred throughout the West, have made venue owners rethink their security approach.
“You have to think about risk management and how you’re going to manage this risk. One way you do that is by having risk control mechanisms in place and a lot of places have gone out and gotten barriers. You see a lot of smaller cities now putting up things like Jersey barriers and portable barriers, so that’s risk control,” Morman explains. “Going back to Las Vegas, I don’t think we’ve ever witnessed anything quite like that. You had a somewhat secure venue but then the perpetrator is at a hotel quite a good distance away, so what I think industry leaders are going to have to come up with a way to control that risk.”
Hardening Soft Target Perimeters
Because the presence of law enforcement and security is one of the biggest deterrents for those looking to carry out attacks, Donovan recommends extending the stationing of police officers and guards out away from stadium gates to show adversaries that the outer perimeter is not being ignored.
Additionally, Donovan says venues should think about leveraging the latest technologies to expand their surveillance capabilities. “You have cameras and other technologies that can help you identify potential bad guys. It just comes down to a budget and a desire to really push the envelope of the security posture for your event,” he adds.
However, Donovan admits that even taking the Mandalay Bay as an example, it might not have initially been perceived by some as a risk of being a gunman’s perch as it did not have balconies. Authorities say Paddock used a hammer to break out two of the windows in his room from which he fired from.
“I think when you couple this with the Manchester attack and Paris two years ago, you put these together and you say, ‘we’ve got to be more vigilant and diligent in securing the exterior of our events and do the best that we can to reduce that threat,” Donovan says. “Part of it is a dollars and cents discussion, part of it is a technology discussion and a partnership with law enforcement discussion.”
During his time in law enforcement at Ohio State, Morman says they always had concerns about someone trying to attack fans attending football games there, particularly in the areas where tailgating took place as it was obviously not as secure as the inside of the stadium.
“How do you control that? You have to put controls in place, but then again, that has to be based on intelligence,” he says. “I think our biggest threat, not only in the event security world but in any type of security, is that lone wolf terrorist who no one really knows about and it is starting to sound like that is what happened (in Las Vegas.).
The Future of Venue Security
When it comes to protecting fans once they enter a venue for an event, Marciani says the major sports leagues, along with federal, state and local law enforcement, have done a tremendous job of preparing and training for all possible scenarios and keeping threats at bay. However, this increased vigilance inside of arenas and other venues has also resulted in terrorists changing their tactics.
“I think we did such a good job that the mentality of terrorists have swung to more of a focus outside of those hardened soft targets to look at other ways to cause damage and I think that’s why we’re talking about perimeter extensions, etc.,” Marciani explains. “It changes all the time, we have to be cognizant of what is going on around us in the sense of what strategies are being used by terrorists and we have to adapt to that.”
While the slogan, “See Something, Say Something,” has been used to the point that it has almost become cliché, Morman says that security and law enforcement has to figure out a way to become more proactive moving forward.
“I think we’re getting there,” Morman says. “I subscribe to that layered concept of security and pushing those security perimeters further out but sometimes that’s a hard sell if you’ve got a venue promoter that says, “well, what’s my risk and why would I want to put these Jersey barriers up to keep cars from coming close to my venue?’”
Morman says that the industry is constantly changing and that the lessons learned from this incident will be incorporated into all future venue risk mitigation plans moving forward. “You already should be saying, ‘what can go wrong here?’ In planning security for that (concert), that type of incident probably never entered their mind,” Morman says. “We’re going to have to think about what if, could this occur here, and then how do we mitigate that risk if it does.”
Despite the carnage that was inflicted in Las Vegas, Marciani doesn’t believe the shooting will deter people from hosting or attending large, outdoor festivals and other events across the country. “Since 9/11, we’ve had a philosophy in this country and that is we need to continue our lifestyle and be who we are… but I think the difference will be the locations of these open-air events might have to be reviewed regarding what risk factors might be in place to conduct those events,” he says.
About the Author:
Joel Griffin is the Editor-in-Chief of SecurityInfoWatch.com and a veteran security journalist. You can reach him at [email protected].
