Explosion, smoke, screams - emergency services train situation picture "mass of injured"

Created: 06/13/2022, 16:59

Large-scale exercise for BRK and THW at the old town hall in Bruckmühl: After an explosion, numerous injured people were trapped in the building and had to be rescued.

© Torsten Neuwirth

The BRK and the THW Miesbach were now involved in a cross-district exercise at the old Bruckmühler town hall - with all the trimmings.

Miesbach/Bruckmühl – Friday, 4:39 p.m., Bruckmühl: The sound of an explosion shook the town center.

Seconds later, three more thuds.

Panes of glass burst, dark smoke rises from a basement window at the old town hall.

Then there is an eerie silence – until cries for help tear the silence apart.

That was the initial scenario for a large-scale exercise by the Bruckmühler and Miesbach Red Cross (BRK) and the Bad Aiblinger and Miesbacher Technisches Hilfswerk (THW).

Staircase in danger of collapsing: rescue must be carried out through the windows

The emergency services, who arrived every minute from 5:11 p.m. with blue lights and sirens, were faced with a confusing situation around the former town hall: an injured youth called for help from the window of the former meeting room on the first floor.

Extremely loud music was coming from the building.

Smoke also escaped from a shattered basement window.

The BRK and THW command and control centers were set up first.

At the same time, the two operations managers obtained an initial overview of the extent of the damage.

The stairwell was in danger of collapsing due to the extreme explosion, so the rescue of people had to be coordinated via the windows.

A diffuse scenery prevailed in the building over three floors.

While traumatized young people stayed in the attic,

The situation in the basement, which was completely smoky, was completely opaque in the truest sense of the word.

A total of more than 15 young people were located, who were spread throughout the building and showed a wide variety of injuries from minor to severe injuries.

Make-up team does a great job.

They even model a broken iron bar in their stomachs

In the run-up to the exercise, the emergency representation group of the BRK district association in Rosenheim had "conjured up" realistic images of injuries on the faces, hands and legs of the 15 actors using lots of make-up, blood paint, plastic and modeling clay.

These included burns and cuts, pelvic fractures as well as states of shock and lower leg fractures.

One actress even had a broken iron bar stuck in her stomach.

With realistically made-up pictures of injuries, 15 “victims” claimed the Red Cross.

© Torsten Neuwirth

Hard work with respiratory protection: emergency services break through the wall on the first floor

After the so-called first phase of chaos had been worked through, the rescue, first aid and first aid measures were tackled simultaneously at several deployment sites with clearly structured command structures via a casualty collection point.

In addition, all injured persons received an injured person's tag card with important data from the rescue services during the initial inspection.

Short and concise commands echoed back and forth across the extensive operational area and through the floors of the building.

The first injured and traumatized young people were rescued with a THW telehandler through a window on the first floor.

Two THW breathing apparatus wearers, who had to break through a wall on the first floor, did the hard work to enable a transition from the south to the north part of the building.

A large number of gas bottle-like containers with indefinable contents provided additional incendiary and explosive material.

Wearers of respiratory protection from the THW searched for and rescued the disoriented and injured under extreme physical strain in the basement area.

Some of the latter had to be carried outside on a stretcher through a narrow basement window.

A construction fence there made it difficult to evacuate.

also read

"Real impertinence": Vacationers rumble over bad bike path at Tegernsee

E-wheelchair driver crashes in the Taubenstein area - mountain rescue service happens to be on site

Hard work: THW workers breaking through the wall.

© Torsten Neuwirth

Parallel to these focal points, first aid was provided by emergency doctors and paramedics at the casualty collection point.

Great attention was also paid to intensive patient care and post-injury review.

At 7:52 p.m., the code word “end of exercise” came over the radio from Michael Lederwascher and Georg Faltlhauser, the BRK and THW trainers.

Trainer Mathias Huber from THW Miesbach, together with Bruckmühl's Vice Mayor Klaus Christoph and Bad Aibling's local representative Bernd Reinartz, drew a first positive summary: "After the initial 'chaos phase' - what's going on, what needs to be done, where, when - was overcome , the necessary rescue measures were engaged in the situation picture 'mass of injured' and tackled in a well-structured way with clear command structures.

The interaction between BRK and THW worked well.

The points where there was a problem have been noted and will be worked through better in the future.”

Actor and heavy equipment

The BRK Bruckmühl including First Responder and the BRK Miesbach with a total of seven vehicles and twelve emergency services took part in the cross-district and cross-organizational exercise.

In addition, the THW Bad Aibling and the THW Miesbach with 36 emergency services.

The emergency vehicles included a telehandler, two mobile control centers, four equipment vehicles, a personnel carrier and a multi-purpose equipment vehicle with a light mast.

15 members and three make-up artists of the emergency representation group of the BRK Rosenheim completed the "exercise ensemble".