As with anything, practice makes perfect. On Tuesday at the Canyons Village Cabriolet parking lot, local law enforcement agencies participated in a training exercise meant to prepare first responders for real-life scenarios.
Over 200 people from several agencies participated, including Park City Police, the Summit County Sheriff’s Office, the Park City Fire District, the National Guard and Utah Highway Patrol. Some Intermountain Park City Hospital staff also played a role.
Park City Fire District Battalion Chief Joe Sharrar said the practice session is especially important given the influx of visitors during ski season.
“These events are something we need to train on just because of the tourist destination that Park City is,” Sharrar said. “It’s important that we go over how we’d operate on these events. Obviously, we never want this to happen. This is worst case scenario, but it’s good to know how they prepare for events like this to occur.”
In Tuesday’s exercise, police officers and firefighters responded to a fake bomb blast in Canyons village that resulted in concocted critical injuries. High school drama students covered in fake blood stood in as “victims,” as first responders went through their response procedure.
Summit County Sheriff Sgt. Skylar Talbot said no information was given ahead of time, in order to make the mock disaster more realistic.
“One of the really nice things about an exercise this big is we have one overall exercise, the 30,000 foot view, but each agency then can have their own exercises,” Talbot said. “For example, the fire department is dialing in on some of their practices and some things that are only relevant to them. While over at the hospital, they may be drilling down on their own policies.”
The practice scenario ended with a mock press conference, in which officials role played by making statements and responding to questions from the media.
