The above headline appeared in the October 13, 2017 edition of the NY Post, less than two weeks after the horrific shooting at the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas. The NY Post article can be accessed here. Both incidents have something in common: the central role that improvisation played in responding to the emergencies. Put succinctly: “To succeed, planning alone is insufficient. One must improvise as well.” — Isaac Asimov To be […]
An earlier post introduced the Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC), a public-private partnership between the United States Department of State and the Private Sector. See http://www.excelsioradvisory.com/overseas-security-advisory-council/. While OSAC’s focus is on international security issues, there are a number of additional open source intelligence resources available to organizations contemplating doing business overseas. The World Fact Book. Published by the Central Intelligence Agency, the World Fact Book (WFB) provides information on the history, people, government, economy, geography, […]
Traveling to unfamiliar locations abroad can present a myriad of challenges. Encountering security, legal, financial or medical issues while away from home can be daunting. Fortunately, the United States Department of State provides a number of resources to help mitigate such travel risks. One resource is: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/traveladvisories/traveladvisories.html/. Here the Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs posts Travel Advisories. Travel Advisories are issued for each country of the world, follow a consistent format and use plain […]
In April of 2013, the American College of Surgeons convened the Joint Committee to Create a National Policy to Enhance Survivability from Intentional Mass Casualty and Active Shooter Events. The impetus for the committee was the active shooter incident that occurred a few months earlier at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. The committee’s purpose was “to create a protocol for national policy to enhance survivability from active shooter and intentional mass casualty events.” […]
Originally developed by Air Force Colonel John Boyd as a decision-making process for combat operations, the OODA loop is a structured process that can be easily applied beyond its intended military context. OODA stands for: Observe, Orient, Decide and Act. As proposed by Boyd it is represented as follows: A simplified version of the Boyd OODA Loop: Observations are the inputs. They are the facts and circumstances upon which decisions will be based. Orientation is […]
For much of the last century the use of tourniquets to control bleeding in the prehospital setting was discouraged as they were viewed as doing “more harm than good.” Recent studies have called into question this understanding. The results of one such study appeared in the Summer 2015 edition of the Journal of Special Operations Medicine. The study, Prehospital Use of Hemostatic Bandages and Tourniquets: Translation From Military Experience to Implementation in Civilian Trauma Care […]
Most of us are familiar with Benjamin Franklin’s famous adage “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Unprecedented access to information in today’s digital world oftentimes results in information overload. Paralysis by analysis may be worse than no analysis at all. One concise resource that US companies have to keep abreast of international security issues and incidents is the Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC). Founded over thirty years ago, OSAC is a public […]
Recent Posts
- Excelsior’s President & CEO Appointed to Serve as an At-Large Representative to The Regional Emergency Medical Services Council of New York City, Inc.
- New York State Amends School Safety Plan Requirements to Prohibit Realistic Active Shooter Drills
- Critical Incident Review: Active Shooter at Robb Elementary School
- Mass killing database: Revealing trends, details and anguish of every US event since 2006
- Robb Elementary School Attack After Action Reports Released