Emergency drill held at Montgomery Regional Airport
The Montgomery Regional Airport has held a full-scale emergency drill to prepare various agencies for a real-life disaster.
The drill was held this morning, involving various first responders.
Students from ASU and AUM were used as the casualty passengers on a mock flight that needed emergency responders’ assistance.
After the exercise, they gathered to find out what was done right and what could be improved.
“This is a requirement for our FAA regulations, where we simulate a mass casualty event so this is part of our compliance that we have to do every three years,” Montgomery Regional Airport interim Director Loyd Jenkins told Action 8 News. “We call it a tri-annual, so to make sure that fire response is good, airport response is good, law enforcement response is good and also partnering with local providers.”
“We help them with the logistics of the exercise, establishing it, bringing in all of the outside agencies and partners to help make this happen and then we also assist with the evaluation and observing process and then we help them write the after-action report as well,” Wade Lyles, the director of the Montgomery City-County Emergency Management Agency said.
“I think I’d have to be a little more cautious, and I would have to be a lot more grateful, I’d be a lot more grateful to the people who are there helping the plane, guide the plane to be a lot more grateful to the people who are on the plane helping us to get seated and everything like that, because this is a very special, hard job that they have to do and honestly, I didn’t think it was all this much,” Marcellus Carpenter, III said. He is an ASU student who volunteered to help.
