737 shares SHARE TWEET SMS SEND EMAIL Photo: Centennial College There’s been a mass shooting and subway collision —firefighters and emergency services arrive on the scene , but many are injured and hospitals are overwhelmed. A behind the scenes look at what happens in prep! Cue the make-up, wounds and fake blood! — Centennial College (@CentennialEDU) This was the scenario Centennial College simulated Thursday, when over 500 volunteers, including about 350 students, worked through a mock disaster at the school’s Morningside campus in Scarborough, Ontario. The annual event, which is in its 11th year, helps train students from Centennial’s paramedic, nursing, pre-fire service, social working programs and others to handle large-scale disaster situations First-responder services students are on their toes thinking quick at the ! — Centennial College (@CentennialEDU) Staff from 11 local hospitals participated in the event, as well as professionals from other emergency crews, such as theToronto Fire Service. The event draws people from over 100 miles away to see the production and learn more about disaster situations, according to Centennial’s communications officer, Mark Toljagic. And to his knowledge, Centennial College is the only school in North America to simulate a mock disaster of this scale. Toljagic says local hospitals look forward to the event because it allows them to test systems and try out ideas that wouldn’t be possible during their normal, day-to-day operations. What’s more, it helps pinpoint communication breakdowns and bottlenecks in their systems, he says. “The idea is to overwhelm the facility and push people to their limit, push the systems to their limit,” Toljagic says. Results of the Mock disaster shooting are evident. Now it's time for the students to put their learning to action! — Centennial College (@CentennialEDU) The event this year was even more realistic than those in the past. Makeup artists were brought in to make the mock victims’wounds look more lifelike. “It is important to give it an air of authenticity so we hired a couple of makeup artists to really do some good work and sort of maybe scare people a little bit,” says Toljagic. “The more chaotic we can make it, the more it can test people.” The college’s Morningside campus includes a non-operating hospital, where nursing students normally learn and practice, for the event. Additionally, this year firefighters practiced extracting victims from a subway tunnel using the campus’ Spanish Steps, a large staircase outside of the school’s library. (this is an exercise) — Kira Machado (@MachadoKira) The event has grown in participants over the years, which Toljagic attributes to growing interest in emergency planning. “Emergency planning has become a whole kind of new science, so for that reason we’ve been getting more and more interest,” Toljagic says. , Centennial College said the simulation allows “students to work with professionals in health care, emergencyresponse and community wellbeing as they manage the patient load, family reunification and critical needs resulting from two mass casualty incidents.” “It pays off dividends in the long run,” Toljagic says. For the first time the province's EMAT set up a mobile field unit and joined in! — Centennial College (@CentennialEDU) Brooke Fox is a student at University of Colorado at Boulder and a USA TODAY College digital producer. , , , , 737 shares SHARE TWEET SMS SEND EMAIL Related Stories Comments