Schoolchildren were made to hide under their desks to practise a terrorism drill dreamt up by their head teacher.
Pupils at Ellon Academy, Aberdeenshire, had to go into a staged lockdown to prepare them for an intruder or chemical incident. Parents were told it was a new policy for all schools in the area – but no others have carried them out and other councils said their schools don’t practise the drills.
And some are now questioning why it was arranged at all. According to the school’s head teacher Pauline Buchan, the drill was part of a “new procedure” for all Aberdeenshire schools.
In a presentation to parents, she said she brought it in due to an incident at another school she worked at in 2012. Paul Hawksworth, a homeless dad-of-two, scaled Fraserburgh Academy and held a six-hour protest over benefits cuts.
He later apologised for “any inconvenience” he caused and said it was a last-ditch attempt to get help.
Showing a picture of the man, Buchan said: “A new procedure that Aberdeenshire schools have to practise is a lockdown drill. Around 10 years ago when I was acting head teacher in a previous school there was a man on the roof and he was protesting about some personal things.
“We had to put that particular school into a lockdown scenario but the difficulty was that we had no idea what the man had up there with him.” She explained that the Tannoy would go off: “The phrase we will use is ‘Project LD – the Lima Delta project will now begin’ and that gives staff and pupils the signal to go inside and stay inside.”
It’s thought Lima Delta stands for “lockdown”. She said it would be used for a chemical incident, emergency blocking entry or exit of the school and if there was an intruder children should stay away from windows and doors.
One parent, whose child took part in the drill, said: “It makes me worried that this is happening and that the school felt the need to bring something like this in. My daughter took part in the drill and I think she was really quite scared.
"She was asking me what it was needed for and if someone was going to try to shoot them in school or something.”
Another mum, whose 14-year-old also took part in the drill, added: “My initial reaction was that this can only be a good thing if it is designed to increase safety but I’m curious about why other councils aren’t doing the same. If there is a known, or higher risk, of this type of threat to young people in Aberdeenshire, then I would like to know more about it so I can make a fully informed decision about sending my daughter to school.”
She said that her daughter described the drill.
She added: “She said the intruder drill involved hiding under a desk and the classroom door being locked. We both questioned how effective hiding under a table would be if an intruder gained access to the school.”
Bosses at Aberdeenshire Council said that there was no such policy in place and that the drill had been done by the school of its own accord.
A council spokesman said: “No new health and safety policy has been introduced to our schools and the drill at Ellon Academy in early November was part of testing its emergency response plans. Not all schools will choose to run a lockdown drill and testing of emergency response plans is a decision for the school.
“Lockdown scenarios could include an intruder on the school site or a major incident in the community. Parents and carers were notified of the drill in weekly newsletters sent home in September and October, via the school’s Facebook page, and an update on the successful test was provided in November.”
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