Law enforcement agencies responded in force to reports of an active shooter situation at Corry Station in Pensacola today but found no evidence of a shooter or any victims after a thorough search of the premises.
According to Sheriff Chip Simmons, emergency services received calls at approximately 10:15 a.m. reporting a possible active shooter in one of the buildings on the Corry Station campus. Two individuals claimed to have heard three gunshots, prompting an immediate multi-agency response.
- “We responded, PPD responded, FDD responded, and our federal authorities responded as well,” Sheriff Simmons said in a brief phone call minutes ago.
Multiple law enforcement teams conducted a complete sweep of a four-story building on the premises. Their initial search revealed no signs of an active shooter or any victims. Sheriff Simmons indicated that teams would conduct a second sweep of the building before clearing the scene entirely.
- “We have cleared the building once, and we’re going back to double-check and clear it a second time,” Sheriff Simmons explained.
Challenges: The sheriff noted that the operation faced some logistical challenges, including navigating stairwells and securing access through difficult-to-breach doors, which required gathering keys and coordinating entry methods.
Investigation Not Closed: As authorities found no immediate threat, they began releasing building occupants while continuing their investigation. Sheriff Simmons remained cautious in his assessment, stating, “I can’t say it’s nothing to it because we’re doing that review, but we are always trying to release people because the building’s secured it looks like, and there’s no victim.”
- Corry Station is home to the Naval Technical Training Center and serves as a significant military communications training facility in the Pensacola area.
Authorities will continue to investigate the source of the reported gunshots.
This is a developing story. Stay tuned.
The current issue of Downtown Crowd magazine describes on page 22 that on March 6th NAS Pensacola, to include its Corry Station, was participating in a nationwide force protection exercise. I have heard nothing about that exercise in local legacy media reporting. Was the Escambia County Sheriff participating in last week’s exercise? If not, why not? Who was actually in charge of the response to the March 6th incident? If not the Navy Security Forces, why not? How long did it take Navy Security Forces to respond? Corry Station isn’t all “that” big. Do Navy Security Forces Officers have the keys to buildings and doors on Corry Station? I hope so. Why would Deputies even be involved in finding keys to doors? What was the full scope of the response? There sure seemed to be a lot of law enforcement vehicles. How many ambulances? The bigger issue, aside from the issue of who is in charge of responding to threats at Corry Station, is if any lessons have been learned since the 2019 attack at NAS Pensacola. I’ve read the Navy’s damning report that describe security deficiencies. (The report is heavily redacted.) Was anyone held accountable? I then spoke with a member of the Navy Security Forces who described a lack of confidence in the leadership of NAS Pensacola. He confirmed some of the security-related findings of the report. If the Navy isn’t going to do it, the BCC should direct a no-holds barred review of the county’s response to the March 6th incident and assess if the problems identified in 2019 have been fixed or allowed to fester.