This was the scenario: A call came in to Whitfield County 911 at 9 Wednesday morning. A train had collided with a box truck on Needham Drive resulting in a possible chemical spill.
Within minutes, Dalton Fire Department personnel were on the scene of the crash, assessing the situation. There had indeed been a release of two corrosive chemicals: phosphoric acid and caustic soda.
Dalton police blocked off the area. As each minute passed, representatives of other agencies arrived. Whitfield County Emergency Medical Services (EMS) ambulances arrived to carry those exposed to the chemicals to the hospital. Deputies from the Whitfield County Sheriff’s Office and firefighters from the Whitfield County Fire Department arrived to help, and the mobile command vehicle from Whitfield County’s emergency management service arrived to help coordinate the response.
It was all part of the drill.
“We’ve got 10 different agencies here either taking part in the drill or helping us evaluate it,” said Claude Craig, Whitfield director of emergency management. “We’ve got all of the local first responders — the fire departments, law enforcement, EMS — as well as people from the state and federal levels. We’ve got several private businesses assisting us. All told, we’ve got about 60 to 80 people here.”
Craig said the agencies take part in one county-wide emergency drill each year, and every other year that drill involves a chemical release. That’s required by state law, but Craig says it’s necessary for Whitfield County, which has 138 facilities that handle hazardous materials as well as two railroads that carry them.
Just two weeks earlier, many of these same emergency responders were at the scene of a real chemical release at the Marktec plant, just yards away from the site of the drill.
Whitfield County Fire Department Chief Bruce Satterfield said that was just a coincidence.
“The planning for this has taken several months. We wanted to find a place that we could close off and bring all of this equipment into,” Satterfield said. “In a real event, you might have to shut down Walnut Avenue, but we aren’t going to shut Walnut Avenue down for a drill.”
Craig said the planners tried to make the drill as real as they could for the people taking part in it.
“Nobody knows what the chemical is. Nobody knows how many people will be injured or how badly they are injured except the planning team,” he said.
At the site, firefighters in hazardous material suits were using electronic detectors to determine how strong the chemical was. Dalton Fire Department Capt. Gary Baggett said that would determine where decontamination units would be set up and how close paramedics and others would be allowed to get to the scene of the incident.
That equipment was purchased by the city with a federal grant after the 2004 chemical spill at MFG Chemical Inc. that forced more than 200 families from their homes and saw 154 people, including police and ambulance personnel, seek treatment for chemical exposure.
“We had firefighters trained to deal with chemical releases before that, but we didn’t have the equipment. Now, we have that equipment and we maintain that capability,” said Baggett.
Further, Baggett said that all first responders are trained to the “awareness level” for hazardous materials, learning to look for the placards that label hazardous materials or other signs that may be present.
Officials said the first thing firefighters have to do when arriving at a possible chemical spill is identify what chemicals have been released.
“Sometimes someone is there with a piece of paper that tells us what it is. There should be a placard on a container. Or it may be a facility we have pre-planned and we know what is there,” he said.
Sgt. Shaun Scott was one of two Dalton Police Department officers in the command center.
“We’ll be in contact with the fire department to see what roads we need to close, how far back we need to block them off, where we need to evacuate,” he said.
Along with all of the emergency personnel, about 30 students from the Whitfield County Career Academy and Dalton High School volunteered to play victims in the drill. Some were carried out on stretchers to be taken to Hamilton Medical Center. Others walked out on their own.
Unlike in a real emergency, however, none were placed in the decontamination unit firefighters set up at the scene. But no one complained about not having to be hosed down since the temperature was still only in the high 30s.
“I didn’t expect it to be so cold,” said Jasmine Carroll, a student at the Career Academy.
After the exercise concluded, the planners began a review to see what went well and where improvements could be made.
But the early assessments seemed positive.
“From everything I could see, it ran pretty smoothly,” said Satterfield.
Local News
Related Photos
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Dalton firefighters hose down a simulated disaster victim Wednesday morning. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
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Dalton firefighters remove injured from the simulated phosphoric acid spill Wednesday morning. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
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Dalton firefighter Keith Dempsey guides Brent Dunn, 16, playing a victim of the simulated disaster, to a safe zone Wednesday. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
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Emergency personnel ask Efra Uscanga, 15, about his simulated injuries as they strap him to a gurney and remove him from the disaster scene Wednesday morning. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
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Dalton firefighters Darryl Mathis, left, and Keith Dempsey move "victim" Levi Carroll on a SKED stretcher during the disaster simulation Wednesday as fellow Dalton High student Efra Uscanga waits to be rescued. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
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Dalton firefighters Darryl Mathis, left, and Keith Dempsey move "victim" Levi Carroll on a SKED stretcher during the disaster simulation Wednesday. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
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Students from Dalton High and the Career Academy are decontaminated during the simulation Wednesday morning. Matt Hamilton/The Daily Citizen
Discussion
Emergency officials, hospital train for chemical spill
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‘I’ve got to protect myself somehow’
A small house on Gay Street was the scene where Frank Bozzie ran over Horace Morgan with a pickup truck on June 10, according to Sheriff Scott Chitwood. (File photo by Misty Watson/The Daily Citizen)
A man police say was murdered when his attacker ran over him in his yard with a pickup truck told a 911 operator the offender broke in his house and began threatening him.
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