Imagine: you’re trapped in your car and water is rising fast. With each passing second waiting to be rescued, your air pocket shrinks.
Then, you hear the splash of a firefighter entering the water near your car. Help is on the way. In Western Maryland Monday, the Baltimore City Fire Department’s Search and Rescue teams trained for this terrifying scenario.
When people attempt to drive through standing water on roadways, it can put both the driver and rescuers’ lives at risk in only seconds.
“For us, the hazard is, we can get pinned under the vehicle. It can siphon us and trap us. The vehicle can be swept away with us behind it,” said Mike Berna of Atlantic Technical Rescue.
Berna, who has more than 25 years of experience with the Baltimore County Fire System and routinely trains firefighters for swift water rescues, ran Monday’s drills.
He says Adventure Sports Center International in McHenry, Maryland, is one of only three facilities in the country that can provide this type of training.