Liidlii Kue/Fort Simpson - Officials in Fort Simpson are feeling confident about the village's ability to handle an emergency following a test of their response plans.

Scott Cameron, a member of the Fort Simpson volunteer fire department, helps load Curtis McTaggart into an ambulance as part of a live emergency response exercise at the village's airport. - Roxanna Thompson/NNSL photos

On Sept. 13 a live emergency response exercise was held in the village.

The mock disaster tested the emergency preparedness plans of a variety of departments and organizations including the airport, the village, the volunteer fire department, Municipal and Community Affairs (MACA) and the health centre. The Department of Transportation and the GNWT's Emergency Measures Organization co-ordinated the event.

"It's quite the experience," said Scott McIntosh, the village's airport manager, who was in charge of the airport's emergency operations centre.

The emergency scenario was centred at the airport. The event began at 10:20 a.m. when McIntosh received reports that an airplane had crashed beside one of the runways.

The scenario was enacted as if it had actually occurred with the RCMP responding followed by the Fort Simpson volunteer fire department. The roles of the 17 victims on the airplane were played by high school students. They were placed in an old school bus - acting as the crashed plane - placed in the nearby tree line.

The emergency response was complicated by news of another plane crash at a second site along the highway. This crash sparked a forest fire that moved towards the village and cut off road access.

With the scenario unfolding around him, McIntosh managed the command and operations centre in the airport terminal co-ordinating the responses from various organizations. A lot of things had to happen quickly, said McIntosh including having a triage set up so the patients could be assessed and moved in the order of severity to the health centre.

The airport's emergency response plan stood up well under the pressure, he said.

"Everything that needed to be covered got covered," said McIntosh.

Heading into the scenario communications was expected to cause problems. Although there were a few glitches, the operations weren't hindered, said McIntosh.

"It was a really good learning experience," he said.

Out in the field, volunteer fire Chief Pat Rowe said that the 11 members of the volunteer fire department who responded did an excellent job.

"I think they performed really well with the situation we had," said Rowe.

Firefighters began by going through the steps to extinguish a fire to make the scene of the crash safe. A triage system was then started with the wounded being treated. A total of 20 patients between the two sites were assessed.

"It went amazingly well for 20 people I thought," Rowe said.

Looking at the overall response, Russ Head, a security and protective services officer with the airport division, said the exercise went well.

By involving the whole community in the exercise it ensures that all the responding agencies are able to work together, said Head.

"I believe they can respond as well as any other community down south and a lot better than some communities," he said.

In the North small communities need to be able to depend on their own resources because additional help is often far away, Head said.

"Some good things happened during this exercise," said Head.

In addition to the primary responders, other organizations stepped forward to offer assistance such as Enbridge, who volunteered the use of their boats to transport victims to the health centre when the road was closed, said Head.