As a journalist working in a hostile environment,if you are casual about your own security and fail to take heed of the warning signs around you or worst still to even acknowledge your responsibility for your own safety and security, then you may be overwhelmed before you can create an effective defense. Giving yourself reaction time is key. If you are caught in the condition when your alert levels are totally down you will need five or six seconds to realize what is happening, get your wits about you and respond. The reality is you will often not have that amount of time to respond.
Situational awareness is the process of recognizing a threat to your safety at an early stage and taking measures to avoid it. The most vital aspect of threat recognition is your mental mindset. If you remain unaware of your surroundings and oblivious to the fact that a potential target then the chances of you recognizing the threat and therefore being in a position to take countermeasures, and hopefully, are very slims. A person living in an ‘’it will never happen to me’’ frame of mind will never see the incident coming and will usually go into shock and freeze if attacked.
To succeed in any crisis situation you must be attentive to your surroundings, continually evaluating it and reacting to what you see or feel.
Don’t me be fooled, you can be stupid, inattentive, and oblivious in your working environment day in day out and be lucky and not get injured, kidnapped or attacked, however, sooner or later the odds will be stack against you and a casual attitude to your own safety will get you hurt. Ignorance or denial makes a person’s chances of recognizing the threat and avoiding it slim to none. This is why apathy and complacency are so deadly.
Should you be attacked when not ‘switched on’ and taken completely by surprise you will freeze up in shock and denial while your mind is forced to quickly adjust to the situation you find yourself in. During this time, you will be in no condition to react, fleet, or resist.
By Isaac Abraka
