Northeast Community College will be the site for a mock disaster exercise later this month that involves many sectors of the community.
Along with Northeast, the communitywide effort will include Faith Regional Health Services, Norfolk Fire and Rescue, Madison Rescue, Hoskins-Woodland Park Rescue, Madison County Sheriff, Norfolk Dispatch, Norfolk Police Department (if an officer is available), and others, including media. It takes place on Tuesday, August 26, at 7:30 a.m. and should be concluded by about 11 a.m.
The mock disaster exercise will have a realistic bus crash scenario that helps to train emergency responders and medical teams, along with college officials and other disaster response personnel. There will be fake victims, along with some members of the public and others taking part.
Melanie Thompson, Northeast director of Risk Management, said Faith Regional typically has at least one of these mock disaster exercises every year. Northeast agreed to be part of this year's exercise, including hosting it.
“Nobody wants to have a mass casualty event,” Thompson said. “It’s not possible to just wake up one day and say, ‘Today is going to be the day.’ Instead, we do what we can to prepare. While we all have done what we can do prevent these types of things, things happen, and so if it does happen, we will be better prepared for what we will do.
“It’s going to be a little chaotic, especially at first,” she said. “There’s a lot of moving parts.”
The schedule for August 26 includes activities at the “crash site” on Northeast’s Norfolk campus, Emergency Operations Center activations across the city, a Joint Information Center established, and a media briefing conducted at the Lifelong Learning Center.
The training exercise will be communicated with signage, social media, electronic signs and by traditional media.
Any media members planning to attend are asked to respond via email to Thompson at mthomp18@northeast.edu.
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