Apalachee High School installed Centegix CrisisAlert panic buttons just one week before the September 4, 2024 shooting, and Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Hosey said the system prevented an even higher death toll. Yet two students and two teachers were still killed. How does this affect the limitations of panic button systems in stopping initial fatalities?

Question

Apalachee High School installed Centegix CrisisAlert panic buttons just one week before the September 4, 2024 shooting, and Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Hosey said the system prevented an even higher death toll. Yet two students and two teachers were still killed. How does this affect the limitations of panic button systems in stopping initial fatalities?

Accepted Answer

The CrisisAlert system at Apalachee High activated within seconds when teachers pressed their badges to alert law enforcement and trigger automated lockdown messages. Yet shooter Colt Gray fired multiple rounds in under a minute, killing Mason Schermerhorn, Christian Angulo, Richard Aspinwall and Christina Irimie before officers arrived. The FBI Active Shooter Report from 2023 shows 37% of incidents end in under five minutes and 43% conclude before police arrive. Even sub-two-minute response times cannot prevent initial casualties. Real prevention requires upstream policies: universal background checks under H.R. 8 correlate with 15% reductions in homicide rates, while permit-to-purchase laws cut firearm homicides by up to 28% according to Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School research from 2020.

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