Mock Mass Casualty Incident Educates Bus Drivers and First Responders

PROCTOR - Rescue squads responded to a school bus accident, but it's not what you think. It was a drill helping first responders and bus drivers to be more prepared."What if it happens? What do you do? This is a learning experience for everybody, for fire fighters, my drivers," said Curt Benassi, the Transportation Supervisor for Proctor Public Schools.This mass casualty training focuses on teaching school bus drivers what it's like to be in a severe accident and learn how the fire departments and rescue squads would respond."Normal days you're walking down the aisles of the bus but now today you're walking on the seats," said Benassi.Bus drivers acted as patients to get a feel for what students would be going through and rescue squads made the right moves to get them to safety."If we were able to tell the kids what was gonna happen and how they were gonna be rescued as soon as possible it would calm them down and make them feel a little bit better," said Proctor bus driver Wally Mattson.All the bus drivers there agree this is something that will help them if they're put in this awful situation. "You'd have to be reassuring the kids that help is on the way but they are gonna get you out as soon as they possibly can," said Mattson. Lake Superior College's Emergency Response Training Center, Proctor School District and neighboring fire rescues organized the exercise.To get a better understanding of what to do if this scene became a reality."A bus is a different animal. It's totally made different than a car," said Benassi."It's just a good experience for all of us to understand you know what can happen if things go wrong," said Mattson.