Emergency preparedness no mean feat

A call comes down the line to the Karratha air traffic control tower, a plane has been struck by lightning on its way to Port Hedland from Perth and needs to divert.

The plane has gone through rapid decompression and is minutes away from the Karratha airport.

The tower scrambles airport staff as emergency services are notified and the on-site Aviation Rescue Fire Fighting unit gets out on the tarmac.

However, there is no actual plane and while police, fire and ambulance vehicles are in fact rushing to the airport a small bus full of community volunteers sits at the end of a runway waiting to simulate it’s descent as part of a biannual emergency exercise.

It’s a big undertaking.

Helicopters going back and forth to the oil rigs continue to land and take off while the simulated emergency carries on.

First on the scene is the ARFF. Once the “plane” has landed they assist the passengers off and make sure everything is safe and any dangerous goods on board have been contained.

The passengers have all been given roles to play to add to the realism for the respondents with some in shock, others difficult and aggravated, while one walks away from the group towards the terminal and needs to be retrieved.

One of the disgruntled passengers asks repeatedly for her cat stowed with the luggage. Meanwhile police arrive and set up a forward command post not far from the scene.

Karratha Volunteer Fire and Rescue Service and St John Ambulance members help with the triage and separating injured passengers from the able bodied, the State Emergency Service unit was a no show — there was a breakdown in communication and they did not get the call out.

Medics deal with decompression related maladies such as a burst ear drum and blood nose while one passenger is unconscious.

Eventually the passengers are taken to a makeshift terminal in the airport’s new $1 million workshop where they are processed by Qantas staff and Department of Child Protection and Family Services representatives.

The charade doesn’t end though as the desk staff is grilled about what hotel and flight arrangements will be made, or whether the passengers’ families in Hedland had been notified, and what to do if their belongings and wallets were still on the plane.

Finally the exercise finishes and everyone is treated to a sausage sizzle.

Karratha Airport executive manager Mitchell Cameron said it was important to run these kinds of scenarios so staff and emergency workers were ready in the unlikely event of an accident.

“It makes us better at our job and identifies were we need to get better,” he said. “We appreciate the community assisting and the volunteers for providing assistance.”

Passenger and shock victim Marlene Boundy said it was great to be a part of the exercise and she’d learnt a lot about what happens at the airport as well as how emergency service providers respond in these kinds of drills.