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In the commander’s chair: EMS One-Stop With Rob Lawrence

Jason Killens, chief executive of the UK’s Welsh Ambulance Service, discusses the complexity of response to an 800 casualty incident across four separate locations

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Jason Killens was the deputy director of operations for the London Ambulance Service and played a major part in the command and control of the response to the London terrorist bombings on 7/7 2005.

Recent acts of mass violence during active shooter events and other incidents in schools, churches and businesses continue to highlight the need for a multi-pronged strategy for both training and response.

This special EMS1/Lexipol guide outlines lessons identified from past incidents that can direct EMS involvement in pre-planning mass gatherings, improve multi-agency cooperation, and inform incident command and response strategies on the ground: Mass violence: How lessons identified inform training, response.

In this edition of EMS One-Stop, Rob chats with Jason Killens, chief executive of the UK’s Welsh Ambulance Service. During the London Bombings, Jason was the deputy director of operations for the London Ambulance Service and played a major part in the command and control of the response to the UK’s first multi-site, simultaneous major incident. Jason describes training staff to deal with major incidents, the complexity of response to an 800 casualty incident across four separate locations. He also describes lessons identified and the inquiry that followed.

Read Rob’s article on Lessons for the incident commander gleaned from the 7/7 2005 London terrorist attack and listen to the podcast below.

Rob Lawrence has been a leader in civilian and military EMS for over a quarter of a century. He is currently the director of strategic implementation for PRO EMS and its educational arm, Prodigy EMS, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and part-time executive director of the California Ambulance Association.

He previously served as the chief operating officer of the Richmond Ambulance Authority (Virginia), which won both state and national EMS Agency of the Year awards during his 10-year tenure. Additionally, he served as COO for Paramedics Plus in Alameda County, California.

Prior to emigrating to the U.S. in 2008, Rob served as the COO for the East of England Ambulance Service in Suffolk County, England, and as the executive director of operations and service development for the East Anglian Ambulance NHS Trust. Rob is a former Army officer and graduate of the UK’s Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and served worldwide in a 20-year military career encompassing many prehospital and evacuation leadership roles.

Rob is a board member of the Academy of International Mobile Healthcare Integration (AIMHI) as well as chair of the American Ambulance Association’s State Association Forum. He writes and podcasts for EMS1 and is a member of the EMS1 Editorial Advisory Board. Connect with him on Twitter.

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