In January 2024 a combination of emergency services and police forces experimented with their joint response to a string of simulated terrorist incidents. North Yorkshire’s police, fire and rescue, and ambulance service merged with counter-terrorism police and York Minster police. The entire exercise was supervised by the national counter-terrorism security office.
The operation came in reaction to the Manchester Arena enquiry, which concluded that platforms such as York Minster should conduct examinations to understand the risk of terrorist attacks and be able to take proportional and reasonable measures against them.
The exercise had been scheduled months in advance and was supported by the City of York council and the city’s Protect & prepare coalition group. Strategic exercise lead for North Yorkshire Police, Chief Inspector Mick Roffe stated: “This was a great opportunity for the emergency services to take part in an exercise along with the Minster Police. “The evening provided an opportunity to test our joint working in dealing with a no-notice violent attack.”
York Minster’s Chief Operating Officer, David Colthup stated: “We take seriously our responsibility, and work very hard, to ensure that those who visit and worship at York Minster feel safe and will be safe. “We are grateful for the patience of all our neighbours – residents and businesses – for any disruption they may have experienced during the exercise. I hope they feel reassured that we are better prepared to deal with every eventuality.”
Exercise Spring Resolve was prepared and coordinated by the Home Office, working closely with partners from the British Transport Police, Metropolitan Police, North Yorkshire Police, Counter Terrorism Policing North-East, London Fire Brigade, London Ambulance Service, North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service and Yorkshire Ambulance Service.
The exercise desired to test the collective emergency services reaction to a series of no-notice violent attacks across multiple areas, effective multi-agency command and control arrangements to prevent the attacks, save lives and launch effective and timely consequence management and recovery. The exercise was part of the standard counter-terrorism testing and exercise schedule which takes place across the UK. In London, the exercise applied a mixture of live and notional play and included multiple episodes in rapid succession, on the transport network and other publicly accessible locations.
North Yorkshire Fire & Rescue lead on the exercise, Tony Peel stated: “Being part of an exercise in such an iconic location within the city and county has been a great experience for all those involved. The support of the City of York Council is appreciated.”
Owen Hayward, head of emergency preparedness, resilience and response (EPRR) and special operations at Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust, stated: “This exercise has provided a great opportunity for emergency service colleagues to come together, and we have taken away valuable learning that we can use to refine our processes and approaches to the many challenging scenarios we may be faced with.”
In York, the scenario included a further no-notice attack at a publicly accessible area close to the city centre. The exercise experimented with communication flows from attack scenes, via strategic command centres and directly into central government. COBR discussions were held on both days, and government ministers and senior officials were also engaged.
