BRI, firefighters, SMS alert sent to local residents: an attack exercise was held near Rouen
By Jean-Baptiste Morel
Published on
If this Tuesday, June 28, 2022 you were within a radius not exceeding 1.5 kilometers around the Zenith of Grand-Quevilly (Seine-Maritime)and that your cell phone was onthen you may have received a text which, if you were not aware of it, could surprise you for a few moments.
” Attack in progress inside the premises of the Zenith”, was it written there, in a message starting and ending with the notion of exercise. Because yes, it was indeed a mass killing type exercise, intended to test a new information system for the population.
On site, national police, gendarmerie, judicial police, research and intervention brigade (BRI), national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office, departmental fire and rescue service (Sdis), Samu, Civil Security, etc. took part in the exercise, which therefore made it possible to try out the FR-Alert device, responsible for the dummy alert messages that some received.
If the press was not invited to the exercise, a debriefing was held in the evening at the prefecture of Seine-Maritime, in the presence in particular of the prefect Pierre-André Durand and the public prosecutor of Rouen Frédéric Teillet .
“The terrorist threat remains”
“There were two objectives, explained the prefect of Seine-Maritime Pierre-André Durand: to test the FR-Alert system of a party, and to conduct a crisis exercise around the theme of an attack, mass killing. A theme less “familiar” to the department than those of “natural risks and technological risks”, he relates, adding that “the terrorist threat remains, we must remain alert”.
As part of the FR-Alert test, when people with their phones on within a radius of 1.5 km around the Zénith received the alert message, the prefect reports that “two messages were broadcast”. They have been received for all people who have 4G and 5G phones”. People with only 2G or 3G have not received it, but from the fall, the prefect promises, the technique will be refined and they too will benefit from it. As for the testimonials read on social networks from people who have not received the said SMS despite the appropriate equipment, Pierre-André Durand explains that the operator Free is not currently connected to the service, but will be by the end of the year for its official establishment. Uninstalled Android and iPhone updates can also be the cause of non-receipt of these messages.
But overall, “the first returns confirm the good reception of the messages, it is satisfactory”, comments the prefect, who adds that five calls for help by people who did not understand that this was ‘an exercise were reminded to send the SMS, translated to an estimated 20,000 people.
“A very interesting exercise”
As for the rest of the exercise, it “made it possible to test the good coordination between the first responder police services (Bac etc.), and those of the specialized services (BRI, etc.)”. A total of 300 people, extras and speakers, took part in the exercise. In detail, the attack, led by two terrorists, started at 1 p.m. and the scenario ended at 4 p.m. “The results are positive, acting from the action of the police and emergency services”, welcomes the prefect.
“We never want to have to use” the device tested today, complete Frédéric Teillet, public prosecutor of Rouen, who was also mobilized on the exercise: “The prosecution participates in the coordination of services, it is essential that all everyone talks to each other, let no one bother anyone. Its role is also very important in the management of victims, for identifiers, in particular, but also in helping victims, for whom this is the beginning of a long legal journey. »
Prefect and prosecutor congratulated all the services involved, pointing together to “very positive results”, and also some “ways for improvement”.
Associations not invited
Ahead of this press conference, representatives of theAssociation of victims of Lubrizol and of theUnion of Lubrizol Victims presented themselves in front of the prefecture, to be informed to the press that they were not consulted within the framework of this exercise. “Last February, we asked to attend the exercise, we received a refusal”, explains Christophe Holleville. “We simply wanted to watch, observe without intervening, then participate in the debriefing, because we find that this alert system is going in the right direction. We were told that we had to ‘respect everyone’s skills’. But where is the citizen’s gaze in history? A questionnaire translated to the people who received the alert message is not enough, it is a strategy error. When will we all work together? »
Pierre-André Durand, for his part, pointed to a “loss of confidence and of winning with Messrs. Holleville and De Carvalho: on the one hand because we provided all the answers to the hundreds of questions they may have asked, and on the other hand, because we also don’t want to be dragged through the mud all the time like they do in their tweet. We no longer cling to what these people say.
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