“Incidents” are for documenting suspicious packages, fires, bombings, explosives-related recoveries, explosions, hoax devices, and bomb threats.

The “Activity” section is for documenting non-incidents such as training, destructs, operational stand-by, magazine inventories/inspections, equipment maintenance, courtroom testimony, re-certs, briefings, peer review, etc. The “activity” section is not for documenting “incidents.”

Reporting “incidents” in BATS ensures that your squad is accurately represented in the national database as well as Congressional and other reporting. This is not only important to the successful conclusion of an investigation but can also “connect the dots” to other cases or identity a particular type of device that may be associated with a known bomb maker (i.e., signature). When Incident information is entered into the Activities section, this information is not available to your fellow bomb technicians and investigators when they conduct their queries of the system.

The latest version of BATS features significant “user-driven” improvements adding to the system’s overall user-friendliness. In addition to the Advisories and the Investigative Resource Library, you have access to details on hundreds of thousands of incident records. As always, your agency is in control of the level of access that other agencies have to your own incident records.

Note: Use of BATS requires that if an Activity entry is part of an Incident, that related Incident MUST also be entered into BATS. For example: An explosives Disposal (Activity) of Recovered Explosives (Incident) or a Fire Scene Examination (Activity) of a Fire (Incident). The USBDC reserves the right to remove access to BATS due to not reporting Incidents.