The 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster Drill scenario involved a tornado hitting the Mock Wedding.
The tornado siren sounded.
The day began with sunshine and heat – perfect for the SUNY Broome Mock Wedding. When the skies began to darken, the students hesitated and then pressed on with the ceremony. After all, the show must go on, as any good wedding planner knows.
Students playing victims in the Mock Environmental Disaster were outfitted with tags describing their medical condition.
As with every Mock Environmental Disaster, the scene turned quickly and suddenly: A tornado tipping tables, flinging debris and downing power lines, resulting in mass injuries and casualties. Screams, sobbing, the wail of sirens – followed by a steady stream of professionalism that sought to make order from chaos, snatch life from the jaws of death, heal the injured and console the bereaved.
Putting the finishing touches on the victims in the 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster.
The seventh annual Mock Environmental Disaster drew students and departments from across campus, in the effort to train the emergency responders and healthcare providers of the future.
The 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster scenario unfolds
(While the Southern Tier isn’t typically hurricane alley, the scenario may not be as farfetched as it would otherwise seem. The National Weather Service did issue a severe thunderstorm watch that afternoon for the region and a tornado warning for Oneida County.)
Paramedic students were the first on the scene, while Criminal Justice students kept bystanders from getting in their way. Health Information Technology students gathered all the information medical providers would need for patient records. X-Ray Tech students scanned for broken bones and
A paramedic student tends to a victim at the Mock Environmental Disaster.
other injuries, while Nursing students stabilized patients and Clinical Lab Technicians ran needed blood tests.
The most unfortunate victims were visited by Dental Hygiene students in a makeshift morgue, where the latter used dental records to determine identity. Those who recovered enough to regain some mobility were treated by students in the Physical Therapist Assistant program, who evaluated them for gait issues and treated a variety of injury-related issues.
“Walking wounded” head to their designated area in the 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster,
“It gives us a first glimpse of what we’ll be getting into,” said Derek Sturdevant, president of the PTA freshman class. “We usually practice with each other, so this also gives us a chance to practice with strangers.”
It was the first mass disaster drill for Ron Mason, a second-year student in the accelerated Paramedic program. He appreciated the opportunity the drill presented for hands-on learning, particularly in how to triage patients in a mass casualty incident. By practicing these skills, students will be ready to
Medical Assisting students tend to the “walking wounded” during the 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster.
respond to real incidents once they’re in the field, he said.
“I’m hoping to keep it as realistic as possible,” he said prior to the start of the drill.
Nancie Regan, a first-year Medical Assisting student, saw the drill from the other side: as a victim. Playing a “walking wounded” wedding guest, she was streaked with fake blood and a bone jutted from her arm. Rather than a gurney or the morgue, she found herself on the grass, her vitals measured by her Medical Assisting peers.
Paramedic students need to triage victims and determine what order they will be treated in during the 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster.
Being on the other side of a medical emergency is a valuable experience to future care providers. “I’m learning how it feels to put myself in my patient’s shoes, if they were in a disaster,” she said.
The Mock Disaster is also a learning experience for Hospitality Program students. The catering class prepared meals for first-responders, and Event Management students set up the pre-disaster wedding scene. The flowers, billowing table cloths and rose petals looked fit for any swank affair, until they
Paramedic students coordinate treatment during the 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster.
were unceremoniously tipped onto the grass by a roaring tornado.
Jessica Nurczynksi and Jessica Peake, taking a break after the main bout of food preparation, said the exercise gave them the opportunity to experience the fast pace of mass food production.
The students faced some obstacles, just like they would in any true outdoor catering job. The changeable weather and particularly the rising wind made some aspects of preparation challenging, noted Peake, a dual Event Management and Hotel and Restaurant Management major. And, of course, there was the massive nature of it, similar to what the Red Cross would do in responding to disasters.
Paramedic students transport a patient during the 2018 Mock Environmental Disaster.
“It was really like an assembly line,” reflected Nurczynski, an Event Management major.
