Police goof up, fail to cordon off Shivaji Park during mock drill

At a mock disaster drill on Wednesday at Shivaji Park, conducted in collaboration with local hospitals and different agencies, the Mumbai police failed miserably as it could not cordon off the areas of disaster properly.

After the simulated bomb blast in two tourist buses, which ‘injured and killed’ 70 persons in the buses and 28 on the street, mediapersons and bystanders were seen walking into the area where the ‘victims’ were convulsing in pain.

A similar problem had arisen at the 26/11 terror attack at Hotel Taj, Nariman house and Hotel Oberoi, when mediapersons and bystanders disrupted the counter-terrorism operations.

Meanwhile, the policemen, who were asked to participate in the drill, were under the impression that they were supposed to do bandobast of the area. Only when asked to cordon off people and bystanders, did the police know that they were supposed to do?

“We were not given proper instructions,” said a police officer, requesting anonymity. Interestingly, the policemen, who attended the five-day workshop on disaster preparedness and health services, and the ones, who turned up for the mock drill, were different.

One of the participants, Dr Srihari Cattammanchi from Sri Ramachandra University, Chennai said, “I saw one policeman trying to tell a mediaperson to stay out of the area and the journalist threatened him back. We didn’t expect so many mediapersons to turn up.”

“It is important to learn from our mistakes. The day we make no mistakes, the mock drills should stop,” said Dr Ajay Desai, director of Lifesupporters Institute of Health Sciences (LIHS), which participated in the drill.

The casualties were first labelled into red patients (urgent and critical), yellow (urgent and require intensive care), green (patients suffering minor injuries) and black (dead) by the agencies on the field — Mumbai fire brigade, the civil defence and the BMC.

The patients were taken to Hinduja hospital and Sion hospital for treatment. The agencies’ preparedness on the field was evaluated by international agencies like New York Presbyterian, New York Fire Brigade and other international organisations.