MOUNTAIN VIEW COUNTY - The county’s aviation advisory committees have approved new emergency response plans for the county-owned Olds-Didsbury and Sundre airports.
The two plans are essentially identical and cover things such as the activities and requirements of emergency responders including firefighters and police.
“They are completely new plans,” Chris Atchison, Mountain View County's director of legislative services, told the Albertan. “They were developed as part of our continued work to develop out both of the airports as economic drivers for the region.”
The plans describe emergencies as “any unplanned or unexpected event that disrupts normal operating conditions and has the potential to harm the life, health, or safety of a person, or damage to property or the environment if not controlled, contained, or eliminated.”
The plans include detailed evacuation procedures:
• Alert all building occupants always ensuring your own safety.
• Upon hearing the alert, all persons are to stop what they are doing immediately.
• Calmly make you way to the nearest exit and assemble at the designated muster point.
• Close all doors behind you.
• Contact 911 when you are safe.
• Assist injured persons until emergency responders arrive.
• All person are to remain at the designated muster point until further instruction.
• Determine whether all occupants have evacuated the building and are accounted for.
• No person hall return to the building until it has been cleared of any danger by emergency responders.
The plans have been developed for potential emergencies that could occur at the airports, as well as to be compatible with the incident command system (ICS) under which the county, emergency response agencies and the province operate.
“In the event of an emergency, emergency service responders are to be contacted via 911. Mountain View County directs the management of all emergencies to emergency service responders,” the plan reads.
“Emergency service responders (police, RCMP, Alberta Health Services ambulances, fire departments) ensure their staff are equipped and trained to handle a variety of emergency response situations.”
Potential hazards identified include: aircraft collisions; fires resulting from fuel/fluids/chemical spills, structure fires, electrical fires and wildfires: explosions; toxic emissions; line breaks; excessive natural phenomenon such as severe wind, rain, hail, snowstorms, tornadoes, severe thunderstorms, blizzards; and wildlife.
“Any or a combination of the above could lead to an emergency response. The degree of response would be determined by the nature of the emergency,” the plan state.
