Major emergency drill planned at Almac HQ

The Emergency Services - Fire, Police and Ambulance - along with Almac Group and the Met Office NI are holding the joint training exercise to test their emergency response plans to a large scale incident on the site.

The training exercise will take place on Sunday from 10.30am–5pm and that the public is being warned there will be a large scale emergency service presence on site during the exercise.

Group Commander, Mark Smyth, NIFRS Southern Area Command explained, “The public should not be alarmed when they see the emergency services at Almac on Sunday 27th November.

“This is a pre-planned and co-ordinated emergency training exercise for all the agencies involved.

“This simulated incident will enable us to test our operational incident command and will also test how all the agencies work together in their response to such an incident.

“As a fire and rescue service we are prepared and well-rehearsed in readiness for these types of major incidents.

“It’s through these large scale, multi-agency training exercises that we can learn and refine our capabilities in preparation for any major incident on site at Almac Group.

“I would like to thank all the partner agencies involved in the pre-planning for this exercise and thank the Almac Board of Directors and Health & Safety teams for their co-operation and for the use of their facilities during the exercise.

“I would reassure the public that disruption will be kept to a minimum but they should be aware of the heightened emergency service activity taking place on site at Almac on Sunday.”

Wayne McMeekin, Group Health, Safety & Environmental Manager at Almac welcomed the exercise, “We are very pleased to support the emergency services for this simulated event on our site.

“It is important we facilitate operations of this nature to ensure the services we rely on most are fully prepared and able to react appropriately in the event of a major incident occurring.”