Introduction
There’s no question that crowds are exciting. But when things turn chaotic, that excitement can turn into a dangerous situation. Crowds have the ability to wreak havoc on a city or town if not properly managed. Say’s Dr. Michael Hilton ,when someone finds themselves in charge of managing crowds during an emergency situation, it can be difficult to keep them under control. Crowd management requires training and practice—the more you know about what works and what doesn’t work, the better prepared you’ll be when something happens!
Practice makes perfect.
Practice makes perfect.
It’s important to practice your crowd control techniques, so that when the time comes and you need them, they will be second nature.
Set up traffic control points early.
- Set up traffic control points early.
- Use cones and other markers to set up your traffic control points. This will help you direct people in the right direction, whether they are evacuating or trying to get into the area.
- Use traffic control signs so people know what they’re supposed to do at each point of the evacuation process (e.g., “STOP! GO BACK!”).
Understand the crowds you need to control.
The first step to controlling a crowd is understanding what type of crowd you’re dealing with. Crowds can be split into two main categories: passive and aggressive.
- Passive crowds are generally composed of people who want to be there, but aren’t necessarily interested in the event or product being promoted. This includes things like spectators at sporting events, concertgoers, and fairgoers–anyone who isn’t actively participating in an activity but has chosen to attend because they enjoy watching other people do so from afar.
- Aggressive crowds are those comprised of individuals who have no interest in what’s going on around them; they just want something that they perceive as valuable (such as money). These types of crowds are usually formed by theft or robbery attempts at events where there’s lots of cash floating around (like concerts).
Develop a strategy for handling mass emergencies.
In the event of a mass emergency, you’ll need a strategy in place that can be followed by all personnel. Developing this plan will help ensure that everyone is on the same page and working toward the same goal.
First, define the problem: What are you trying to accomplish? What are your goals? Once these issues have been determined, develop strategies for accomplishing those goals while mitigating risks associated with them.
Effective crowd control requires planning, practice and patience.
Effective crowd control requires planning, practice and patience. The first step to effective crowd control is to plan your strategy in advance. This may seem obvious but it’s important to know what you want to achieve before you start work on the ground.
The second step is practice – both with your team members and with local partners (such as security forces). You should get together regularly for drills so that everyone knows their roles and responsibilities in a crisis situation; as well as how they will respond if something goes wrong or changes direction unexpectedly during an operation.
The last element of successful crowd management is patience: being able to remain calm under pressure helps keep everyone focused on doing what needs doing rather than panicking about potential risks associated with working near large crowds of people
Conclusion
We hope that this blog post has given you some insight into managing crowds in emergency situations. As we mentioned at the beginning, crowd control is a complex topic that requires careful planning and practice before it can be implemented effectively. The key takeaway here is that effective crowd control requires planning, practice and patience.
