{"id":52506,"date":"2025-11-14T20:29:18","date_gmt":"2025-11-14T20:29:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/2025\/11\/14\/once-unthinkable-extreme-security-is-becoming-a-best-practice\/"},"modified":"2025-11-14T20:29:18","modified_gmt":"2025-11-14T20:29:18","slug":"once-unthinkable-extreme-security-is-becoming-a-best-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/2025\/11\/14\/once-unthinkable-extreme-security-is-becoming-a-best-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Once unthinkable, extreme security is becoming a best practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

Article Originally Published Here<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

With hundreds of mass shootings a year, gun detectors, second sets of doors and drones are on the shopping list at more properties.<\/p>\n

CEIA USA makes money when schools buy its metal detectors, but one of its employees would rather not see the market grow as fast as it has.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not right,\u201d Tom McDermott, a company representative who advises schools on safety issues,\u00a0said in an NPR episode<\/a>\u00a0last month. \u201cWe need to solve this problem. It\u2019s good for business, but we don\u2019t need to be selling to schools.\u201d<\/p>\n

School officials are unlikely to stop buying anytime soon. Since the 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado, when 13 students and a teacher were killed, there have been 400 school shootings, NPR reported based on a\u00a0Washington Post analysis<\/a>. The shootings have helped create a school security industry in the U.S. that market research firm Omdia says is\u00a0$4 billion in size<\/a>\u00a0and growing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSome people want to put their heads in the sand and pretend like it\u2019s not going to happen to them,\u201d Sarah McNeeley, a sales manager with SAM Medical, which sells trauma kits, said in the NPR episode. \u201cBeing prepared and having these devices in the schools is essential.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not just schools driving security spending growth. The U.S. physical security market, of which commercial properties are a big component, is expected to grow to almost $57 billion in 2030, up from $38 billion in 2023,\u00a0research shows<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Incidents like the\u00a0shooting at 345 Park Ave.<\/a>\u00a0in July are likely behind some of that growth. With high-profile tenants like the NFL and private-equity firm Blackstone, the office building had a\u00a0reputation for strong security<\/a>\u00a0like many other buildings in Manhattan. But the gunman was able to walk through its doors without incident despite openly carrying an AR-15.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes significant resources [to] prevent somebody from having free flow access through a facility,\u201d Matthew Dumpert, global leader of enterprise security risk management at financial and risk advisory firm Kroll, said in a\u00a0Reuters report<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dumpert and executives at other firms told Reuters the number of calls they received from organizations seeking building security advice skyrocketed after the shooting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cClients [called] with questions about how to protect themselves from similar attacks,\u201d Dumpert said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As long as shootings remain elevated, facilities managers will be under a spotlight for the steps they take to secure their buildings.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will not accept this as \u2018business as usual,\u2019\u201d employees at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta\u00a0said in August<\/a>\u00a0after their office was sprayed with more than 150 bullets by a gunman\u00a0who reportedly<\/a>\u00a0was worried about vaccine safety. Speaking through their union, the employees said they wanted bullet-resistant glass installed in all of the buildings on the CDC campus, armed guards, weapons detection capabilities and an enhanced alert system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTemporary fixes won\u2019t cut it,\u201d the employees\u2019 union said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Schools with resources are\u00a0increasing their use<\/a>\u00a0of security guards,\u00a0adding bullet-resistant glass<\/a>\u00a0to their buildings and contracting to have\u00a0drones operate<\/a>\u00a0on their campuses. A handful of Florida schools are participating in a pilot program in which they\u2019re maintaining on-site drones that can be deployed if there\u2019s an incident.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a school shooting, most of the death happens in the first 120 seconds, so [the drones are] about how quickly can you get there to engage the shooter,\u201d Justin Marston, CEO and co-founder of drone company Campus Guardian Angels, said in a\u00a0CBS News report<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Florida has approved $557,000 in its 2025\u20132026 budget to fund the drone program in three school districts, the CBS report said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Security list<\/h3>\n

There are a handful of items facilities managers can put on their shopping list if they don\u2019t want to take chances on security, Shaun Pace, president of San Antonio-based security company Pace Protection,\u00a0said in an Inc. report<\/a>. These include bullet-resistant glass, a second set of doors at entrances, gun detectors, a panic alarm system and heightened elevator security.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Different grades of bullet-resistant glass are available but facilities managers can also coat building exterior windows with bullet-resistant film, which is cheaper and can buy occupants time to find cover before the bullets penetrate the glass, Pace said in the Inc. report. \u201cEvery second can save a life in these situations,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A set of security doors directly behind the main entrances is a way to isolate the interior of a building from intruders after they\u2019re inside. \u201cGuests shouldn\u2019t be able to just stride into an office building, especially places housing high-profile companies like the NFL and Blackstone,\u201d Pace was paraphrased as saying.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Weapons detectors installed directly behind the security doors can trigger an alert if someone\u2019s carrying a gun or an explosive device. The technology is more advanced than a standard metal detector. It costs between $40,000 and $50,000 for each unit, Pace said.<\/p>\n

In the 345 Park Ave. shooting, occupants were texting to warn others in the building of the intrusion, something they wouldn\u2019t have to do if the building had a panic alarm system, Pace said. Ideally, the system would announce the threat over a voice intercom and trigger flashing lights on each floor. Relying on occupants to text one another, Pace said, is far from \u201cstandard practice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Enhanced elevator security can be a last line of defense by enabling any security officer or building management employee to shut the system down if an intruder is heading to another floor. In the case of 345 Park Ave., only the security guard who was slain in the incident could shut down the elevators, the Inc. report said, so the shooter was able to get to an upper floor, where he shot a Blackstone employee.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Having only one person able to shut down the system is \u201cabsolutely not\u201d a best practice, Pace said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The list of security upgrades might seem extreme but there have been 350 mass shootings in the U.S. since the start of this year, according to\u00a0Gun Violence Archive<\/a>. The two most common settings are workplaces and schools, where 28% and 22% of the shootings occur, respectively,\u00a0according to a tracker<\/a>\u00a0maintained by the Rockefeller Institute of Government.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The post Once unthinkable, extreme security is becoming a best practice<\/a> appeared first on Security Guard Services Magazine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Read More<\/a><\/p>\n

\u200b<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Article Originally Published Here With hundreds of mass shootings a year, gun detectors, second sets of doors and drones are on the shopping list at more properties. CEIA USA makes money when schools buy its metal detectors, but one of its employees would rather not see the market grow as fast as it has.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s not right,\u201d Tom McDermott, a company representative who advises schools on safety issues,\u00a0said in an NPR episode\u00a0last month. \u201cWe need to solve this problem. It\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1971,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-security-guard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52506\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.excelmedias.com\/Security\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}