REALISTIC TRAINING EXERCISES
VOLUNTEERS CORNER
It is a beautiful sunrise as you and other firefighters drink warm coffee and eat jelly donuts. There is no hose to pick up and no overhaul to do, and the attic and the basement are not in the same place. Today, you face a different challenge: You are conducting a realistic training exercise. You wonder, will it be a valuable exercise or wall it be a disappointing failure like so many you have attended in the past? The answer depends greatly on the effectiveness of the scene controller, whose functions are described below, assigned to the exercise.
REALISTIC TRAINING VS. DRILL
Realistic training and the typical drill differ in approach. During a drill the same action is repeated over and over again, hopefully in the same manner. A drill on raising ladders, for example, ensures that department members will carry, raise, and lower the ladder the same way every time. Drilling eliminates the need for firefighters to explain to each other during emergencies their individual preferences for operating ladders.
A realistic exercise, on the other hand, recreates an emergency situation. Firefighters must use their knowledge, skills, abilities, and equipment to bring the incident to a safe and appropriate conclusion. The realism of the exercise helps prepare firefighters for emergencies. Such an exercise generally is used toward the end of the training or planning process.
Another difference is that a realistic exercise provides practical as well as theoretical training. Let’s say that your company has just received a new extrication device. Your training program probably would include a briefing by the manufacturer’s representative, formal classroom extrication training, and a lot of hands-on use with the tool at a local junkyard. Theoretically, this kind of training is supposed to prepare you for a real extrication at a real accident. Theoretically! But we are in the real, not the theoretical, world. Experience has shown that when the theoretically trained firefighter has to respond to real emergencies, the operation does not always go as smoothly as it did in training. Generally, the real incident is the first time the firefighter is confronted by leaking gasoline, screaming victims, poor lighting, severely injured victims, crowds of spectators, police officers, and so forth. Suddenly, the firefighter and fire officers become confused by what they perceive to be a large task. These “trained” firefighters never were faced with all these factors at once. Technically and theoretically, they are skilled, but they are not prepared.
Photo by Doug Mann.
Realistic training helps prepare firefighters and fire officers to deal with all the problems, distractions, stresses, and strategies required to mitigate real incidents. Although this exercise is not the real event either, it incorporates many aspects of a real-life emergency scene. The goal is to make the scene so realistic that the participants can look at it, size it up, and figure out what happened and what should be done. (Note: If it is the first realistic test of your training program, no more than two companies should participate.)
One realistic training exercise I attended was a department’s first response to a major hazardous-materials incident. Although participants were well-trained, active, and aggressive structural firefighters, they were completely overwhelmed by the realism of the exercise. The hysterical plant manager, the large vapor cloud, and the lack of familiarity with the hazardous material completely overwhelmed them. The fun really began when the fireground commander sent the captain in for a closer look and the captain was greeted by very realistic, very vocal victims’ cries and screams. This was the first time the department had encountered anything like this. The fire officers’ inability to sort out what needed to be done first and how to do it created a great deal of confusion. They had no game plan or experience to draw on, since this was their first exposure to such a situation. They were doing the best they could. It was a good thing that their first experience was an exercise, or many lives, including those of firefighters, could have been lost. A repeat scenario went much better.
THE SCENE CONTROLLER
Developing a realistic scene (the building, vehicle, leaking container, and so forth) and scenario (the simulated emergency, which includes the scene and the events requiring intervention by the fire department) is not enough for an effective exercise. It needs a scene controller (SC) to keep it dynamic and realistic.
The scene controller makes sure the action parts of the exercise are as realistic as possible by controlling the exercise in much the same manner as the fireground commander controls the fireground. The SC helps prepare the scene and starts and stops the activities.
The SC is like a director, using the scene and the firefighters/actors to produce the same problems that a fireground commander would face at a real incident. The SC must be involved in all the planning and setting up for the exercise and must be aware of the objectives of the exercise to ensure that it accomplishes them. If the goal, for example, is to teach participants, the SC gives direction and guidance to the firefighters and fire officers. If. on the other hand, the goal is to test a response plan or the effectiveness of training, the SC does not become involved with participants during the exercise.
On the day of the exercise, the SC briefs the victims on how they are supposed to act. Having them play dead is easy but lends little to the realism of the exercise. People portraying victims must “give a good performance.” It is amazing how distracting continuous blood-curdling screams can be to firefighters. Even experienced fire officers can be distracted during size-up by active, vocal victims. The SC also is responsible for victim moulage.
Another responsibility of the SC is to ensure that a description of the scenario and a list of the exercise rules are given to all participants at least one hour before the exercise begins. The rules are guidelines that emphasize the serious nature of the exercise. The scenario description helps clarify the incident in the minds of the participants. The SC further guards scenario realism by clearing the scene of all nonparticipating firefighters and other spectators to secure the area.
THE EXERCISE
The SC, once satisfied that the scene is set and the victims are in place, calls dispatch and requests that the exercise begin. Dispatch then sends the units according to normal dispatch procedures. As the units begin to respond, the SC also assumes the major role of scene safety officer and, as such, must ensure the safety of all victims, participants, and spectators. Should a real emergency—such as an injury to a firefighter—arise, the SC reports it to the fireground commander by radio, preceding his message by the statement, “This is not an exercise.”
Participants must be watched carefully for signs of heat exhaustion or hypothermia. Exercises often are staged during the summer months, and participants may have to be pulled out of action to rest. On a spring day, the ground still may be cold and damp, and simulated victims may become hypothermic.
The SC must keep the exercise moving, observe the participants, and evaluate their actions. The important criterion is that some action is taken—not whether that action is correct. If no action is in progress or planned, the SC gently encourages the fireground commander to take specific steps. The exercise must move quickly, as would a real incident, or it will degenerate into a nonrealistic, useless event.
The SC determines when to “adjust” the scene to keep the exercise viable. During a haz-mat exercise, for example, the SC can open the valve controlling the leak. The best time to complicate the scene is when the fireground commander has taken the appropriate initial steps and the troops are finishing their assigned tasks.
CREATING “VICTIMS”
The SC also can create victims on the scene. In the case of a simulated structure fire, for example, a couple of firefighters could be hidden and the fireground commander notified that they are missing. After a couple of back flips by the commander, the exercise will really move.
Another way to keep participants busy is to have a firefighter pretend to become incapacitated by a heart attack. This will keep several firefighters busy simply trying to get the “victim” to the first-aid station.
If the exercise involves a hazardous material, firefighters, paramedics, and spectators who are inadequately protected (without SCBA or appropriate clothing and gear) can be turned into victims by “contaminating” them with talcum powder and incapacitating them by taping their ankles together with duct tape. Contaminated victims force firefighters to establish a decontamination station.
GENERAL RULES
Use the following as guidelines when designing a realistic training exercise:
- The SC must look different from everybody else on the fireground. Experience has shown that wearing a black-and-white striped referee shirt works very well. I believe part of the success of using this shirt is that it subconsciously puts in participants’ minds the idea that this is a game designed to see how well they can handle whatever the SC throws at them.
- An SC is required at each critical point of the exercise: at the site of the fire, spill, or accident; at the command post; at the decontamination station; at the triage sector; and so forth.
- The SC must be able to communicate by radio with the fireground commander.
- The scene controller must be involved in the planning process and must gear all actions toward supporting the established goals of the exercise.
Realistic training exercises are effective in training fire officers as well as firefighters.
