North Yorkshire Police explains why gunfire was heard and armed police deployed at York Racecourse

North Yorkshire Police has revealed why gunfire was heard and armed police were deployed at York Racecourse.

It was part of a pre-planned exercise led by the Home Office and was not in response to any actual crime or incident.

The police force, alongside the ambulance service and fire service, were testing and strengthening their response in the event of a major incident.

It follows recommendations made following the Manchester Arena Inquiry - Volume 2.

The activities at York Racecourse involved staged explosions and simulated gun fire - no live ammunition was used.

Our strategic exercise lead, Superintendent Jason Dickson, said: “This was a welcome opportunity for the emergency services in North Yorkshire to take place in a national CT exercise. It provided an opportunity to test our joint working in dealing with a no-notice violent attack.

“We tested the strategic prioritisation and decision-making for the safe and effective deployment of specialist and non-specialist resources to scenes and the early consideration of recovery measures.

“We are very grateful to York Racecourse for providing us with the facilities to exercise.”

These exercises take place regularly to test the emergency services' response to no-notice violent attacks.

They allow emergency services to test how well the services work together to stop attacks, save lives and undertake effective and timely consequence management and recovery.

This exercise tested communication flows from attack scenes, through command centres and then directly back into Central Government.