Hundreds of people are running for their lives, chased by zombies across a post-apocalyptic landscape hit by every disaster bad luck could throw at it.
But the annual Zombie Run, that took place just before Halloween this year, is probably the only fun anyone is going to have at Guardian Centers of Perry, Ga., an 830-acre state-of-the-art disaster training facility, built from the ground up to give first responders a crack at negotiating doomsday.
Attendees eat, sleep and breathe disaster in training exercises that can last as long as a week. Core training at the facility includes: chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear defence; tech rescue, including structural collapse, surface water rescue and extrication from vehicles and machinery; tactical operations including SWAT training; medical response; and earthquake response.
Teams face full immersive simulations involving fires, explosions, building collapses, infectious diseases, floods and active shooters. The centre supplies role players to act as survivors, the injured and even angry citizens complaining about inadequate emergency response.
CEO Geoff Burkart says he realized the need for such a facility when he worked for BellSouth, helping to restore communications in the aftermath of hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. Four years of research led him to the conclusion that better training could have made a big difference.
"There are great training facilities throughout the world," he says. "But they’re either run at the academy level to turn newbies into capable fire rescue and tactical operators, or a government facility that is restricted from doing true conditioning in a hazardous environment. We are not for rookies and new teams. We pull together seasoned teams and operators that want to raise the bar on conditioning."
The facility has trained as many as 1,800 people simultaneously in multi-disciplinary exercises. Military personnel work side by side with firefighters, police officers and emergency medical teams.
"The only time these teams will ever come together again is on game day," says Burkart. "In the first couple of days of a major response, it’s largely a matter of deciding who is responsible for what and getting radios to talk to each other. As those hours tick by, people are suffering and dying and property is deteriorating. Training can make the difference."
Burkart sketched out schematics for the facility and assembled private investors. They agreed to buy an abandoned missile plant to begin construction. He hired Fuller Engineering, a company specializing in hurricane-resistant design, to create plans for the robust cityscape. Architectural firm COR3 Design translated sketches and engineering requirements into buildable structures. Vannoy Construction was contracted to build the facility.
"Building a city within a year is a herculean task," says Burkart. "We repurposed a lot of buildings, but new construction included 51 new steel-reinforced concrete, multi-storey buildings, including a street grid. Vannoy had as many as 80 masons working on it nonstop. It’s all a balance between realism and structural integrity. Each one of the collapsed city blocks cost in the neighbourhood of five million bucks to build."
The facility, which opened in 2012, is decorated with piles of rubble as deep as 10 feet. It’s also dotted by abandoned cars, donated by GM following water damage caused by hurricane Sandy.
Special construction features include floors that shift in a simulated earthquake and miles of armoured tunnels underneath the facility that provide maintenance access, but also allow role players to safely place themselves underneath rubble, awaiting rescue.
"You can’t have a role player down there awaiting rescue for two days," says Burkart. "We use the tunnels to allow them to work in shifts."
The design also includes engineered maintenance features that can keep the disaster area "fresh" between sessions.
"I talked to some retired engineers from Disney about that," Burkart says. "Every one of the buildings has a slight crown in the poured concrete floors on every level. Flush fit along the walls are scuppers. After a messy op, we go in with pressure washers and wash it all down and the scuppers carry the water into our closed loop stormwater run-off system."
Guardian Centers has hosted response teams from around the world, including Canada, says Burkart.
"But what never ceases to amaze me is that, despite all we’ve achieved for civilian and military personnel across the globe, I can go to any conference in the world and some high ranking official or the king of a country will come up to me and say, ‘Mr. Burkart, tell me about the Zombie Run,’ " he adds.
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