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UNC Greensboro Mass Casualty Drill Takes On New Weight After Boston Attacks

UNC Greensboro Office of Emergency Management logo
UNC Greensboro Office of Emergency Management

UNC Greensboro students and staff will be among the participants in a mass casualty drill on campus tomorrow morning.  Organizers are using a tornado aftermath scenario to see how first responders react in a crisis situation with injuries. The drill comes just two days after a real-life scenario unfolded in Boston, where two bombs exploded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring more than 100.

Susan Hannah,  an instructor at UNC Greensboro's School of Nursing, says the drill was planned before the real-life emergency played out in Boston.

“I felt very eerie watching that unfold thinking, ’Wow, here we've had this planned for months and right there is a situation where that could be my students going in and trying to help those people,’” she said. “So I think there's going to be a real sense of this could actually happen and I want to take it seriously and learn as much as I can  So that if this happens where I'm at, I know what to do.”

Hannah says first responders can apply the lessons they learn today to other mass casualty events including a terrorist attack. Local EMS technicians and campus emergency management will also take part in the drill, which begins a 9:00 a.m. on UNC Greensboro’s soccer field.

Gurnal Scott joined North Carolina Public Radio in March 2012 after several stops in radio and television. After graduating from the College of Charleston in his South Carolina hometown, he began his career in radio there. He started as a sports reporter at News/Talk Radio WTMA and won five Sportscaster of the Year awards. In 1997, Gurnal moved on to television as general assignment reporter and weekend anchor for WCSC-TV in Charleston. He anchored the market's top-rated weekend newscasts until leaving Charleston for Memphis, TN in 2002. Gurnal worked at WPTY-TV for two years before returning to his roots in radio. He joined the staff of Memphis' NewsRadio 600 WREC in 2004 eventually rising to News Director. In 2006, Raleigh news radio station WPTF came calling and he became the station's chief correspondent. Gurnal’s reporting has been honored by the South Carolina Broadcasters Association, the North Carolina Associated Press, and the Radio Television Digital News Association of the Carolinas.
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