Waterford emergency services take part in major plane crash training exercise

These were the dramatic scenes today as 150 emergency service workers responded to a staged plane crash in one of the biggest major incident exercises ever held in Ireland.

The training drill saw a 60-foot aircraft fuselage placed on Mount Leinster on the Carlow-Wexford border in a crash scenario designed to test the South East Region emergency services in Waterford, Wexford, Carlow and Kilkenny.

Fire crews, An Garda Siochana, the Health Service Executive and local authorities were involved in the simulation, brought to life with real fire and actors playing the injured, who were carried on stretchers to waiting ambulances.

“This is one of the largest scale major emergency incident exercises in Ireland for some time,” said Ben Woodhouse, Exercise Director and Assistant Chief Fire Officer of Carlow Fire and Rescue Service.

“Fortunately, major emergencies such as these are not frequent but this event has been identified as one that could potentially occur and the South East region’s principal response agencies continue to work together on interagency preparedness and response.

“These exercises provide invaluable opportunities for cohesive and collaborative interagency working, as if a service operates in a silo, solely focused on their own area of responsibility and resources, it can affect the overall response to those in need of assistance."

Mary Rose Fitzgerald, HSE Emergency Management Officer, said the exercise was an opportunity to ensure the inter-operability of emergency plans, following three years of emergency management training, planning and exercise development across the principal response agencies.

"An Garda Síochána is delighted to be involved in the planning and coordination of this vital regional major emergency exercise,” said Superintendent Jarlath Duffy, Chairperson of the Regional MEM Working Group.