Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service together with other local and international rescue teams are currently taking part in Exercise Orion – which simulates an earthquake in the fictitious local town of Widley.

Held at Fort Widley in Hampshire, the exercise takes place over 3 days and provides realistic training to the participants similar to that carried out in the Royal Navy’s DISTEX training that every ship undergoes during Basic Operational Sea Training; including limbless and other simulated casualties, public disorder, fires and realistic light and heavy rescues from buildings and bridges.

It is not clear whether the exercise will also involve establishing an emergency hospital and feeding facilities – as practiced by the Royal Navy teams when they prepare for disaster relief of tropical islands or following eathquakes and tsunami events but it is exactly the sort of realistic exercising and training that emergency planners crave but are rarely given funding for.

Of course planning for and participating in the exercise provides enormous value in itself but it is in carefully capturing and acting on the lessons identified that the real value comes. Finding out that policies, processes and equipment doesn’t work during a simulation will save lives and avoid costly procurement mistakes as well as clarifying who is best equipped and most logically responsible for tackling the myriad problems thrown up by the event.

Whilst the exercise is an encouraging development – and it is planned to carry out more over the coming years to maximise the return on investment – it would be advantageous to involve local businesses and the organizations that represent them to bring another perspective to the scenario and see how local companies can assist – for example with heavy plant and skilled staff such as abseiling window cleaners and scaffolders.

For more information and some photos of the exercise you can visit the BBC’s South Today website.