North Carolina EMS Uses Virtual Reality to Train for Disasters

Emergency managers in Brunswick County, North Carolina, have turned to a new virtual reality video game system to train first responders to deal with disaster.

In an article in the Wilmington, North Carolina Star News, Shannan Bowen says the simulator equipment, formally called an Advanced Disaster Management Simulator, will be a training tool for Brunswick County Emergency Management Services and others in the region.

“In a typical training session, a trainer uses a computer to create certain emergency events that are displayed on the simulator’s screens, which are mounted on a wall in front of a class or group,” Bowen says.

The software works by allowing trainees to only see part of the 3-D scenario, as if they were actually there, forcing them to use a joystick to navigate through the scene and communicate with others who are seeing the other side of the scenario on another projected screen.

“It places them in a stressful environment but a controlled environment, so it turns into a learning environment,” EMS Director Randy Thompson told Bowen. Brunswick County’s EMS department is the only agency in that area of the country with this piece of equipment. Only two other agencies – one in New York and one in Florida – have it, Thompson told Bowen.

“In the past we either had a blackboard or a Powerpoint presentation that gives you a scenario,” he added. “What happens with this is it is a virtual reality type of scenario. You’re actually looking at a scenario unfold on the screen in front of you.”