Sonoma County airport conducts all-day emergency training drill

The Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office helicopter Henry-1 circled above the charred fuselage at the Charles M. Schulz-Sonoma County Airport Thursday morning as firefighters, paramedics, and emergency medical technicians methodically responded to Red Cross volunteers who were lying on the asphalt near the plane.

Other volunteers who represented the “walking wounded” sat nearby.

The activity was part of a disaster training simulation meant to test the effectiveness of the growing airport’s emergency procedures, how well agencies communicate with each other and where the “voids“ are.

“The point is to exercise the plan and to see what things we missed,” said Jon Stout, the airport’s manager.

The training is mandated by the Federal Aviation Administration and is held every three years to test local response to a large-scale disaster that would require multiple first responder agencies.

The simulation also tested the readiness of the airport’s own operations specialists, who are specially trained and equipped to respond to aircraft disasters.

The specialists’ Engine 2884, equipped with 1,500 gallons of water, 200 gallons of foam and 500 pounds of dry chemical fire extinguishers was at the scene within two minutes, according to Mike Pansza, an instructor with Fire 139, the Ohio-based company that provided the airplane fuselage prop and simulated fire used in the training.

“Every airport has their airport plan,” John Mure, another Fire 139 instructor. “Until you exercise it, you don’t know if all the parts are going to fit together. It really works out all the bugs.”

Other agencies participating in the training event include the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office, the Sonoma County Fire District, Redcom, the county’s fire and emergency dispatch center, Cal Fire, the American Red Cross disaster team, and FAA air traffic control and flight standards officials.

The airport also conducts smaller scale, annual certification trainings that involve airport staff and the Sonoma County Fire District, said Stout.

This year, the airport combined both the annual certification training and the large-scale triennial training. As a result, disaster training sessions have been conducted throughout the week with firefighters from multiple agencies.

The scenario for Thursday’s training used a fictitious commercial carrier, Wine Country Airlines flight 3270, which departed from STS, the FAA’s identification code for the local airport, bound for Portland.

All emergency Redcom radio traffic during the event used a dedicated channel that could not be heard by the public.

After climbing to an altitude of 28,000 feet, the plane experienced pressurization problems, causing oxygen masks in the cabin to deploy. The captain immediately notified air traffic control at STS of the need for an emergency landing.

With 48 passengers onboard, the plane was full of fuel and the plane’s landing gear malfunctioned on approach. On touch down, the right-side main landing gear collapsed, the engine and fuel caught fire and the passengers were evacuated.

The actual drill itself only took about an hour, but participants spent hours in the morning preparing and staging the exercise. In the afternoon, participants conducted debriefings to discuss what they learned.

Mure said common “bugs” or “voids” include lack of communication, lack of resources such as body bags and, of course, the realization that more training is needed.

Deputy Rob Dillion, a spokesman for the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office, said training sessions at such scale are “invaluable.”

“It’s always a challenge training for incidents this big simply because you have so many players that are part of a call like this,” Dillion said. “Getting everybody to work together is tough.”

For the Sonoma County Fire District, the training was a chance to test run some of its new ambulances in a mass casualty disaster scenario. Earlier this year, the district took over the county’s exclusive ambulance contract.

“We were able to bring out our fire engines, our ladder truck and many of our ambulances,” said Karen Hancock, a spokeswoman for the district.

The district also brought out its Ambu-Bus, an emergency response vehicle specially equipped for mass casualty events like the one simulated Thursday.

You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 707-521-5213 or martin.espinoza@pressdemocrat.com. On X @pressreno.