Evacuation drill was nothing new compared to disorganized bomb threat evacuation

By Elora Brow

Staff Writer

Mira Costa High School recently had their first bomb threat drill to better inform the students and staff of what to do in the case of an actual threat. Although the drill was more organized than the actual threat, the drill itself was nothing new compared to what the students had done during the real threat that took place in December.

In a bomb threat situation, teachers are instructed to lead their students through specific hallways to their designated fields such as the football field, baseball field, and field behind the wrestling stadium. During the drill the students were lead to these fields and held in place there for over an hour.

Once the threat is announced students must turn off their phones until they are within 300 feet of the building because the phones can set off a bomb and interfere with police communications. This is a rule that teachers should strongly enforce because phones can pose as a serious hazard in a real threat.

According to Principal Dr. Ben Dale, the drills are not judged as bad or good, but by how much better it went than the time before. And in this case it was a little better than what occurred during the actual threat a few weeks ago. Although this drill may have gone better than before, there are still many improvements that need to be made to better inform the students of what to do, such as involving the students more.

According to Junior Kayla Elson, the drill didn’t clearly show what would happen if Costa were to receive a real threat, considering that most students sat around bored and  just wanted to leave. On top of this, the process of getting the students into groups for leaving the campus was very disorganized during the real threat. If there is no organization then students won’t be paying attention and will have a hard time following directions.

With the drill taking place in the morning, students did not actually get to practice leaving the campus which is inconvenient because that was the most unorganized part of the real threat. According to English teacher William Brown, he thought that having the drill take place in the morning was beneficial because Mira Costa can receive a threat at any time in the day so students and teachers always have to be prepared.

It is obviously necessary for Costa to have these drills considering the recent circumstances but they need to be more realistic so that the students take it seriously and know what to do in the event of a real threat. Most students just spent the time of the drill on their phones and talking to friends instead of practicing the drill properly.

According to Dale the drill benefitted both the students and the teachers most because they were the ones actually taking actions during it. Although it may have benefitted both students and teachers,  it would be helpful if the teachers informed their classes of what all the students need to do at all times during a threat. If there were to be a real threat, then students would probably have to do a lot more than just sit around talking to friends.

Overall, Mira Costa’s bomb threat drill had good intentions but didn’t make as positive of an impact as it should have. In the future the drill should be taken more seriously and students should play a larger role in it in order for the drill to be as effective as possible.