Mock train vs. bus training drill held in Hanover Township

Jessica Kitzinger got up at 4:45 a.m. so she could get ready to play a bloodied crash victim in an emergency training exercise in Hanover Township on Saturday - and it was well worth it, she said.

"I love doing this kind of thing," said the Elgin resident, who's a member of the volunteer community emergency response trained by the Elgin Police Department.

About 90 people took part in the full-scale exercise held by Hanover Township Emergency Services and staged at Canadian National Railway's Spaulding Road rail yard in unincorporated Cook County.

The event simulated a train tank car striking a car with three people and a church bus with 17 people, with first responders from agencies including Hanover Park, Streamwood, Bartlett, Hoffman Estates and Elgin.

First to arrive was a Bartlett fire engine, whose firefighters quickly determined there was not a hazardous materials situation and doused the tank car with a water hose.

Others assisted and treated the victims, and the Red Cross helped them connect with loved ones.

This was the first full-scale exercise coordinated by Hanover Township Emergency Services, said township director of community relations Tom Kuttenberg.

"After nine years in existence, HTES felt the need for a large exercise to test our training and enhance how we operate everyday with other township first responders," he said.

Bartlett Fire Lt. Richard Wilson said it's only the second time in his 27-year-career that he took part in a training this elaborate. "The big thing with training is that you can never get enough of it," Wilson said.

HTES volunteer Chris Crane helped light up the crash scene and put out a minor fire. "It was very informative. We train a lot, but never in this capacity," he said. "The adrenaline does start to get going a little."

The training went "relatively well," said exercise director Mike Smith, also an HTES volunteer whose role was to oversee the whole thing.

Communication among the different responders was smooth, which is not easy to achieve with everyone on different radio systems, Smith said. One glitch was that first responders had limited use of a water pump because of low fuel levels in one of the vehicles, he said.

The training exercise included mock reporters and photographers, one of them portrayed by CERT volunteer Olivia Chaidez, a sophomore at Elgin High School.

"It's really exciting but it feels real," she said. "If this was to become real, it would be scary. I am glad we are practicing."