MINNEAPOLIS—In the minutes after a major freeway bridge collapsed last summer, police and emergency workers descended upon the chaos in and around the Mississippi River and soon transformed it into an orderly scene.
That response, mostly lauded in a federal report, has been a guide for security officials preparing for the upcoming Republican National Convention. The event is expected to attract as many as 50,000 people to the Twin Cities, including anarchists threatening disruptions.
“It’s more likely that our unpredictable weather or a traffic jam will cause problems—those things that happen day in or day out,” Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek said. “The chances of some kind of incident from anarchists or a major natural disaster happening are not great, but nonetheless we expect to be well prepared for it.”
Neither Stanek nor other security officials involved in preparing the Twin Cities for the convention will publicly speculate on possible threats posed by demonstrators or others. One cautionary tale is the 1999 World Trade Organization conference in Seattle, where 50,000 rowdy protesters overwhelmed police and closed down sessions.
As the Sept. 1-4 convention at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul looms, one anarchist group calling itself The RNC Welcoming Committee is promising blockades of roads and bridges and disruptions at bus stations.
Traffic congestion, a heat wave or late-night revelers could also pose problems, though officials said they are prepared for nearly any scenario.
The Aug. 1 collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge, which killed 13 people and injured another 145, forced police officers, emergency personnel and hospital workers to put into practice the emergency drills they routinely practice.
Within minutes of the collapse—which sent dozens of cars into the river—officers had cordoned off both ends of the bridge where it broke apart while workers searched for survivors in the water. Ambulances took the injured to hospitals while the Red Cross opened a makeshift center in a Holiday Inn for people looking for loved ones.
A federal report gave the city of Minneapolis high marks for its response, singling out its 800 megahertz radio system for streamlining communications and ensuring that various agencies could communicate with each other.
“The first 30 minutes were most critical. That determined the response and leadership aspect of it,” recalled Stanek, who led the effort to recover bodies from the river. “We had to get hundreds of people on the scene to start with the rescue effort. And then there’s preparing for bathrooms, where loved ones could call, what to do about the media, what to do about people who come down to see what’s happening.
“Those first decisions you make are absolutely critical.”
Doug Holtz, a spokesman for the St. Paul Police Department, said the response helped officers and others define their roles in an emergency. “People got to know each other, and people got to see each other work,” he said. “It’s one thing to sit in a classroom, but it’s another thing to see people do it and react.”
He added: “We went over there to help Minneapolis, which had done a fantastic job of setting up a command center, a perimeter, a security zone, a space for survivors. The whole communications thread was unbelievably seamless.”
The federal report did note some deficiencies, however, including the lack of a formal officer to monitor the safety of the first responders on the scene. It also said that many police officers and medics failed to follow an order to evacuate the bridge when instability was suspected.
Between 3,000 and 3,500 police officers, sheriffs’ deputies and state patrol officers are slated to work during the convention, St. Paul police spokesman Tom Walsh said.
Hospitals are also gearing up for the event, though they point to a different tragedy that has helped them hone their response to any potential disaster: 9-11.
After those terrorist attacks, 29 hospitals in the Twin Cities formed a compact so they could coordinate emergency planning and share in the costs of supplies. The federal government has also since required hospitals to hold drills in response to various scenarios, such as a chemical attack.
Rich Huston, the emergency preparedness director for Regions Hospital, said that while St. Paul hospitals didn’t have an influx of patients after the bridge collapse, they learned from watching the response across the river in Minneapolis.
“We will be ready to react on a moment’s notice,” he said.
