Federal and local organizations held training session at Appleton International Airport

APPLETON, Wis. (WBAY) - The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requires airports to hold the exercise once every three years.

The drill mimicked a 186-passenger plane crash. Planes were fixed with live smoke, fire, and 50 volunteers who posed as passengers.

All groups who would be called during a real emergency were on-site for the training. Officials said running the drill every year allows every department to improve its response in case of an actual emergency.

“So our goal is just to make sure that everybody knows that they have a job to do. We want to make sure that we’re securing the airfield, and that we’re responding to passengers in need. And that we’re out there practicing to make sure that we’re getting everything right. We want to continue to practice until it almost becomes second nature so that in the unfortunate event this would have to happen, we know we could do everything we need to do to respond and everything for those passengers,” said Abe Weber, Airport Director, Appleton International Airport.

Over 20 organizations participated in the training. Weber said the drill is just one method of training. He and other staff members will have meetings to discuss how to further correct mistakes that happened during the exercise.

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