Bhubaneswar: To check the level of preparedness of all important stakeholders and how efficient the coordination procedure between different agencies is, a full scale ’emergency and aircraft crash exercise’ was conducted at Biju Patnaik International Airport (BPIA) Tuesday.
As all the airports across the country are always vulnerable to terror attacks, the regular checking of the level of preparedness is an essential exercise in finding out breaches. And, an air crash is an unforeseen possibility for which an airport should always remain prepared.
In this mock air crash exercise, no real aircraft was used, said director of BPIA Suresh Chandra Hota. He added a bus was used in place of an aircraft and 50 people as passengers. “There is a fire pit at the airport where the fire fighting exercise was carried out,” he added.
All important stakeholders of the airport and participants from State Administration and Disaster Management Authorities were involved in the exercise. Agencies like city fire services, city hospitals, ambulance services, NDRF and Orissa State Disaster Management also took part in the drill.
“At different points of the exercise, independent observers were placed to record their observations which were later discussed at a meeting,” said Hota.
PNN
