Rural students participate in realistic emergency response simulation

Editors’ note: The photos depicting injury and death in this story were of actors participating in a simulation of a reckless driving crash.

DUBOIS — Nearly fifty junior high and high school students took part in a jarringly real simulation Tuesday afternoon, introducing them to the world of first responding, emergency management, communications and the medical field.

Students from the Clark County Junior/Senior High School were divided into different groups based on their interests and abilities, to respond to, investigate and cover a staged car accident that “killed and injured” multiple people. The actors playing the injured and deceased were community members whom most of the students knew personally.

Eileen Holden, the Superintendent for Clark County School District 161, says the idea for the simulation came from incorporating a new forensic science class into the school.

“In the fall, we were talking and laying out the plans of what the class was going to do, and it came up that it would be cool to have them analyze a crime scene,” says Holden. “We decided that if (we’re) analyzing a crime scene for them, we might as well get the whole school involved.”

Holden says it took many volunteers to pull off the simulation, including the Clark County Sheriff’s Office, Idaho State Police, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office and Air Idaho Rescue.

“Our hope is that our students can see possible career paths. That they could go, ‘I am excited about what ISP does, or I want to work in the news media, or EMS,’” says Holden. “Career-wise, but also the whole part of seeing how many people in the community volunteer.”

To participate, the students were separated into:

• Incident command, Media and Chaplains
• Fire and Extrication
• Air Communications
• Investigation
• Law Enforcement

Each group had a different task with a leader from that profession (including reporters from EastIdahoNews.com) walking them through their role in a critical incident.

Organizers provided two cars, one that was flipped upside down due to a fake rollover accident, with a person pinned under the car, and one that was the suspect’s car, which included injured people inside, both human and fake.

There was also a lawn mower involved in the crash and “dead” bodies on the ground.

Will Empey, the Clark County Sheriff SRO, and one of the main organizers of the event, says it was important to provide this opportunity for the students, and to make it as real as possible, to help the kids understand the dangers of reckless driving, like drinking or driving behind the wheel.

“It was interesting to watch, especially some kids that normally have a shell, the kind of came out of that shell to do things that kind of pushed themselves,” says Empey. “They really all stepped up, and they only got like a 3-hour training block that we did last week. Just from that, they made it happen, they listened, and still got it done.”

ISP provided fake evidence at the scene, such as shoes, tire tracks, and broken glass, that students had to investigate to determine who was involved, what caused the crash, when it happened, how fast the cars were going, and how they would help the injured.

“Idaho State Police has accident reconstruction specialists, and they went above and beyond to plan out and stage the crash scene that the students could investigate,” says Empey. “There were a lot of moving pieces.

One student was even asked to make a fake death notification to the victims’ families.

Kaylee Shuldberg, a junior at Clark County Junior and Senior High School, was assigned as a dispatcher and learned to serve as the landing zone coordinator with Air Idaho Rescue, directing them to the landing zone.

“I think communication on the radios was one thing that I learned is like, we need to communicate better,” says Shuldberg. “But also, we got to learn how to land a helicopter, so I feel like that was a good learning experience that we got from it.”

Mike Miller, the school’s DARE officer and 911 dispatcher for the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office, says it was important that the event be as real as possible, to teach students what officials do in an emergency, and to get them to start thinking about their own futures and careers.

“We’e had a lot of fun helping them prepare for it, and giving them a sense of the scenario where they simulated either drinking and driving or texting and driving, because either could happen with them,” Miller said. “All communities are hurting for volunteers for fire and EMS. Well, some of these kids, they’re already like ‘Wow, this would be cool to do when I get older.’”

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