CLEMSON — At 10 a.m. on the morning of March 19, a call went out over radio channels about a suspicious man at Daniel Hall on the campus of Clemson University.

The call was followed almost immediately by another — “shots fired.”

The scenario was staged, part of an active-shooter training exercise involving university police, fire and emergency medical services personnel.

After the calls went out, police, fire and EMS personnel began converging on the building.

The day’s work began in the early-morning hours as EMS applied moulage — realistic-looking makeup — to volunteers playing the roles of shooting victims throughout Daniel Hall.

Clemson University director of fire and EMS Bill Daniel said the exercise demonstrated the rescue task force concept, “where our paramedics and EMTs go in quickly behind the law enforcement teams and start treating casualties as quick as we can.”

“The more we practice, the better we are when the real thing happens,” he said.

Daniel said 80 percent of his agency’s call volume is EMS calls.

“All our firefighters are cross-trained as EMTs and paramedics,” Daniel

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