MaritimeGirl11
10-Year Member
- Joined
- Sep 12, 2006
- Messages
- 329
In late October, 200 MMA cadets, 13 area hospitals and 60 other pertinent agencies (Mass. State and Boston Police, Boston Fire Dept., Boston EMS, MEMA, Massport Fire and Rescue and Boston Emergency Management etc.) were recruited by Massport to simulate an airplane runway collision at Boston's Logan Airport. The purpose of this exercise was to test the agency's ability to process up to 500 wounded passengers at one time. Thirty of the 200 cadet "victims" were actual Emergency Management majors who served as observers and evaluators, with several actually assigned to work in the MASSPORT emergency Operations Center with the Incident Commander. The remaining cadets played rolls of wounded passengers with particular injuries and scripts.
A reality provoking explosion provided by the Massachusetts State Police Explosive Ordnance Detachment, helped cement the tone of fabricated mayhem. A few wrecked cars clustered around two giant aircraft, posed nose to nose, added authenticity to the alarming site. Cadets pulled their weight acting confused, hysterical and in pain as they were evacuated from the scene to local hospitals. Many cadets were evacuated from the aircraft by climbing across and down an extended fire ladder from a Boston Fire Ladder truck. When all was over, the MEMA design team complimented Academy cadets for helping make the drill such a great success. And were sure more than a few parents were probably astonished after asking their cadets... "so, what's new and exciting at MMA?"
I got to pariipate in this along with my fellow ship mates. Although if it was real I would have died, it was still a fun and exciting experiene.