By Christopher Collins
Times Record News
WICHITA FALLS, Texas — “Where’s my baby!? Where’s my baby?!” a young woman cries out after two bombs explode at a rock concert Wednesday in Wichita Falls. Her face is bruised deep purple, covered in blood. A thick, white bandage is wrapped tight around her arm as she manages to pull herself into a sitting position. She isn’t the only casualty- a t least a dozen motionless bodies litter the lawn of the Police Training Center on Flood Street.
A first responder leans over her, asking about her injuries, telling her he doesn’t know where her baby is.
“Out of the way! Move!” more first responders yell as they rush back from the lawn with a body on a stretcher. “This is priority one!”
It was one of the worst disasters the city has ever seen. It also was fake.
It was all part of a disaster training exercise orchestrated by United Regional hospital personnel, Wichita Falls police, city firefighters and Vernon College students.
“If we ever have an incident, we know that our community will be ready,” said Fernando Tezaguic, a safety officer with United Regional.
Tezaguic has been organizing the two-day event, called Advanced Disaster Life Support, for about 10 months. It was sponsored in part by the North Texas Hospital Preparedness Council.
After all the bodies were cleared from the lawn, the victims (who were students at Vernon College) had a few laughs in a training center hallway and wiped some of the makebelieve blood from their make-believe wounds. Then it was into a conference room to review how everyone did.
The woman screaming hysterically about her child eventually found it - i t was a blowup doll, as about half of the “casualties” turned out to be.
Tezaguic said he had fun at the event, but he’s also glad it taught participants some valuable skills in handling disaster situations. Most of the attendees were from law enforcement or the medical field. At least one doctor traveled from the Dallas/ Fort Worth area to attend. “The participation was great,” he said. “And the facility was wonderful.”
Attendees learned how to identify chemical and biological attacks and how to work within the system of various emergency responders, Tezaguic said. They also established a procedure for treating victims, assigning a priority level to each one’s injuries. “These are different things you need to know during an event,” he said. “This is a great course.”
These are different things you need to know during an event. This is a great course.”
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