Zombie Apocalypse? Nope, A Rescue Drill at Burton Island State Park

On Friday May 18th Burton Island State Park hosted a mass-casualty incident (MCI) training for AmCare Ambulance Service of St. Albans, and St. Albans Town Fire.

Organized by Clement Roger of AmCare, the training was a great learning experience for park staff. MCIs can really tax the resources of small-town rescue squads. Our island location makes things even more complicated.

Clement arrived around 4pm with several volunteers and got right to work. Using make-up and fake wounds (aka moulage) they set up a gruesome scene resulting from an imagined explosion in our marina. The drill 911 call went out at 5pm and the first rescuers (an AmCare ambulance crew transported by Town Fire) arrived only about 20 minutes later. Park staff jumped right in; helping transport patients with our work boat, and the Knight Island ranger arrived a little while later to help as well.

Just a little over an hour after the drill was initiated all 10 patients had been transported to the mainland at Kill Kare State Park (only a few minutes from the nearest hospital).

It was encouraging to see that even in our somewhat remote location help can reach us quickly. The drill also highlighted the need for good communication between agencies and responding personnel to help reduce the inevitable confusion that would result if we ever had a real incident like this one.

Assistant Ranger Ken

Ken Brown

Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources - UVM
Burlington, VT