Mayor Frank Frühauf personally triggered the fire alarm system at the "Auf der Bein" elementary school on Saturday morning, thus giving the go-ahead for an unusual large-scale exercise.
The following scenario had to be dealt with by fire stations 3 and 4, the rapid response unit (SEG), the command service and the fire department operations center (FEZ):
A fire in a classroom caused massive smoke development inside the building. 12 people were missing and one person was injured. Several teams wearing heavy breathing protection immediately set out to rescue people. Some of the missing persons, played by members of the youth fire department, had to be "rescued" via scaling ladders through the windows. Due to the size of the building, several sections were formed in order to quickly obtain an overall picture of the situation.
The special feature of this exercise was the presence of 222 pupils and 20 teachers. "Immediately after the alarm sounded, all the pupils were evacuated in accordance with the regulations and taken to the assembly point on the sports field," reports head of the fire brigade Jörg Riemer. There, the children were looked after by the SEG staff.
"We would like to thank all the children and the school staff for this realistic training opportunity," said all the managers in unison. After around two hours, the exercise involving more than 75 emergency personnel was completed and everyone was very satisfied with how smoothly it went. In addition to the mayor, Nils Heidrich in his function as deputy BKI and Thomas Müller as head of the public order office also attended the large-scale exercise. "We are well equipped for such a scenario, but hope that we never have to put what we have learned into practice in reality," Riemer concluded.
Text: Christian Schulz