Updated! Now with additional imagery after the jump. (click on 'Read More' to view the complete article.)

Monday 1 September saw Hutt Valley Fire Police and Rimutaka 4926 with lighting plant off to Paraparaumu to take part in a training exercise with members Paraparaumu and Waikanae Volunteer Fire Brigades.

The exercise turned out to be a chemical spill in an industrial area near the airport which consisted of two drums of an unknown type of chemical which had fallen over.

Our job as a Unit was to provide lighting to the affected area and to light up the decontamination line / staging point as well as providing traffic control, man power for the BA tender and drinking water for the crews as they came out of BA.

For the new members of the Unit this provided a chance to see how a decontamination line worked and what role we could play, as well as learning new skills For the rest of the Unit it was a chance to polish up on other skills. This training also gave us the opportunity to show the other crews what the Unit was able to do and what gear we could provide in support of an incident.

As the training was coming to a close the radios sprung into life with a call of "NO DUFF" (a genuine event) and then the message that there was an accident out on the main road adjacent to the exercise zone. A motorcycle and a car had collided. Firefighters and Fire Police quickly took control of the scene with HVFP performing traffic control while the fire crews looked after the patients.

Hutt Valley Fire Police would like to thank the CFO, Officers and crew of Paraparaumu Volunteer Fire Brigade for inviting us to take part in their training and look forward to working and training with them in the future.

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First Image: WAIK381 and AVAL4115 parked near the 'incident'. Second Image: Decontamination Stations set up and ready to go.

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Third Image: PARA377 set up to supply water for the decon station. Fourth Image: SO Lock of HVFP liases with the Exercise OIC. RIMU4926 can be seen in the background, adjacent to PARA377.

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Fifth Image: PARA3726 set up as Incident Command Point. The attached lighting plant is quite effective. Sixth Image: Firefighters experience a practise 'decon'. Usually the water would be on - but for training purposes it was left off in order that each step could be explained and practised.

Water On!

Report and Photos by SO Lock, FP Foster, SFP Biddle.