This last weekend, members of our Sacramento Police Department’s Explosive Ordinance Detail (EOD) and SWAT teams took first place overall in their divisions at the annual Urban Shield Training exercise, hosted by the Alameda County Sherriff’s Office.  This event draws international interest, with over 20 countries at the event this year to understand how to better prepare for high-risk events that they may encounter. Thirty-five teams competed in the event to showcase their operational readiness. Urban Shield is a comprehensive, full-scale regional preparedness exercise assessing each participating organizations knowledge, skills, and abilities as well as the overall Bay Area UASI Region's response capabilities related to multi-discipline planning, policies, procedures, organization, equipment and training. Urban Shield continues to test regional integrated systems for prevention, protection, response and recovery in our high-threat, high-density urban area. The exercise evaluates agencies existing level of preparedness and capabilities, identifying not only what we do well, but areas in need of improvement. Throughout the scenarios, teams will be confronted with events averaging one hour or more in duration designed to test their training, preparation, and decision-making skills. Teams will use technology provided to them for use during the scenarios and will be debriefed after each scenario for their immediate feedback concerning the technology presented to them.

Our EOD team participated in 5 scenarios designed to test the problem-solving capabilities of each team, while building the much-needed confidence to effectively deal with real-life incidents they may encounter. 

Our SWAT team showed a tremendous amount of grit, professionalism, and personal sacrifice during their 48-hour long exercise.  They participated in over 30 scenarios: everything from a nightclub shooting to a terrorist hostage rescue which integrated a tactical medical response.  

The overarching goals of Urban Shield include striving for the capability to present a multi-layered training exercise to enhance the skills and abilities of regional first responders, as well as those responsible for coordinating and managing large scale events. Urban Shield is implemented to identify and stretch regional resources to their limits, while expanding regional collaboration and building positive relationships. Urban Shield challenges the skills, knowledge and abilities of all who participate. It not only improves regional disaster response capabilities, but provides a platform for national and international first responders, as well as the private sector, to work efficiently and  effectively together when critical incidents occur.