St. Cloud Airport Disaster Simulation is Success [PHOTOS]

ST. CLOUD -- The city of St. Cloud hosted a disaster exercise today (Thursday) at St. Cloud Regional Airport.

The exercise simulated a plane crash landing at the St. Cloud Airport. Those who were participating as survivors in the drill were given specific fictional injuries to help test the skills of those responding in the scenario. Each fake injury looked very real, fake blood and pus was used to simulate the injuries.

Many different agencies were involved in the drill. St. Cloud, Clear Lake, Foley and Sauk Rapids fire departments responded. Stearns, Benton and Sherburne County Sheriffs Offices along with St. Cloud, Sauk Rapids, Waite Park and Sartell Police were among the scenarios emergency responders. Gold Cross was also the main emergency medical responder during the simulation.

Fire Chief Dean Wrobbel says the drill was successful and helped identify how emergency responders can improve their skills in crisis situations.

"We keep improving every time, we've gotten better with our communications, we've got a new communications vehicle where we have a dispatcher...so they are running all the emergency communications which in any large incident that [communication] is going to be one of your weakest links," says Wrobbel

A drill is required by the FAA to be done every three years.

The St. Cloud Airport also played a key part in the simulation. Airport director Bill Towel says the airport aided responders in any way possible during the drill.

"The airport was really here simply as a resource, helping if we can but it's all about fire, police and EMS and how well they can do their jobs on the airfield," says Towel.

Towel says he thought all responders did a great job and reacted to the simulation to the best of their abilities.

All agencies will review their official results as soon as they become available and work on specific areas that need improvement.