This was Exercise Unified Response, March 2016, the most ambitious disaster exercise ever attempted in the UK. Just like children in nursery school set up imaginary shops and pretend kitchens, we disaster specialists practise for disaster. If you’re doing this sort of disaster exercise you have to start the ‘activation’ (usually a phone call) with the words ‘Exercise, exercise, exercise’. My very first major exercise was one year after the 9/11 terrorist attacks of 2001. Nobody pisses or shits themselves with fear in an exercise but many real survivors do.

Source: Irish Examiner April 09, 2022 15:44 UTC