A call came in to the Lewis County dispatch center a little before 9 a.m. Saturday about two men involved in a snowmobile crash on the iced-over Beaver River near High Falls, prompting a rapid response by local emergency personnel.
However, both “victims” were wearing insulated wetsuits, and reviewers from Syracuse University were on hand to evaluate both the performance of emergency personnel and the county’s nearly 2½-year-old emergency radio system.
“It’s a benefit to everybody,” county Emergency Services Director Robert A. MacKenzie III said of the training session held off Old State Road in the town of Croghan.
While the primary goal of the exercise was to “test protocols and our radio system,” it also gave members of the Croghan Fire Department’s cold-water rescue team and other first responders a chance to prepare for an actual water emergency, he said.