Above: Perk Players theatre students participated in the DUI Crash Enactment at MGCCC’s Perkinston Campus on April 23. Student “victims,” from left to right, are Briata Jenkins, Donavan Hillman, Wyatt Wood, Lindsey Simmons; and on the ground, Brittany Williams.

Blue lights racing to the scene of a terrible crash are punctuated by the sounds of a fire engine’s sirens. More first responders–sheriff’s deputies, police officers, fire rescue, ambulances and a Life Flight helicopter–all arrive on the scene at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College’s Perkinston Campus. Crash victims can be seen hanging from wrecked vehicles. Emergency personnel immediately cordon off the area, spray everything with foam and begin triage on victims. The jaws of life are employed to remove one victim. Some of the worst injured are loaded into a helicopter and flown away.

The accident, in reality, is a DUI Crash Enactment that included student actors as victims, complete with torn clothing, bruises and blood. The Perkinston Campus Police Department organized the full-scale emergency event on April 23 as part of a county-wide first responders practice exercise. Students from the college’s campus and seventh graders from Stone Middle School were invited to watch the event to educate them on the consequences of driving under the influence.

A victim being loaded onto a Life Flight helicopter.

“The drunk drivers in the scenario were handcuffed and placed in police cars,” said Sgt. Mike McClantoc with the Perkinston Campus Police Department. “Some victims were zipped into body bags and placed in a hearse. It might seem harsh, but these types of visual demonstrations are the best way to show students what could happen and what does happen every day.”

The annual event, now in its second year, included the Stone County Sheriff’s Department, Life Flight, South Central Volunteer Fire Department, Wiggins Fire Department, Stone County Hospital Ambulance Service, Moore Funeral Home, Owens Ramey Funeral Home and Stone County Coroner Wayne Flurry. Parker’s Service Center provided the wrecked vehicles for the scenario.

Theatre student Alex Lince as a victim being cut free from a wrecked vehicle using the jaws of life.

More than 400 people gathered to watch the incident unfold, all solemn and some actually crying. McClantoc said the event does tend to produce an emotional response, even from first responders.

“We set this event up to be as real as we possibly can, so it does have an affect on people,” he said. “For many of them, this is the only time they have seen and had to think about the amount of community response required to save victims’ lives, arrest and adjudicate offenders, and notify victims’ families. It helps bring home how terrible each and every accident like this is. If this event makes students hesitate and think before they make a poor decision in getting behind the wheel under the influence or even getting into the vehicle with a drunk driver, it has been a success.”

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