Portland firefighter/EMTs Will Kenneway, left and Carlton Jones carry a victim during an emergency training exercise at the Portland International Jetport on Saturday. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Fire and police departments from Portland, South Portland and neighboring towns went through the procedures that would be employed should a plane ever crash at the Portland International Jetport.

More than 100 first responders participated in the simulation, which enlisted the help of more than 75 volunteers acting as passengers and flight crew, said Zach Sundquist, assistant airport director.

“The whole point of this drill is to find the failure points,” Sundquist said.

The jetport is required by the Federal Aviation Administration to go through the procedures for dealing with a possible aircraft emergency around a conference table every year, but emergency crews only get a chance to practice such an event in the field once every three years.

“There’s nothing like doing it live and in person,” Sundquist said. “That really is the benefit of today, getting the faces in the same room together, actually physically responding and transporting the passengers to the hospital, to really challenge those systems, make sure all the communication methods are in place and are functional.”

First responders simulated both land and water rescues during the training. Dummies floated in the Fore River prior to the training as crews from Cumberland Fire, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Cape Elizabeth WET Team coordinated their retrieval.

On the runway, fire hoses sprayed a small plane representing the burning aircraft. In a real emergency, firefighters would also spray fire-dousing foam, ensuring that people onboard would have a safe point of exit.

Firefighters hose down a plane during an emergency training exercise at the Portland jetport on Saturday. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Meanwhile, volunteers – many of whom were recruited from local college drama departments – departed from a Metro bus and acted according to their assigned roles. Actors played dead, were carried away on stretchers, limped and wandered around the runway confused while first responders communicated with them and tended to their “wounds.”

Some of the “victims” were transported to area hospitals, including Maine Medical Center and Northern Light Mercy Hospital.

John Cenate, Portland deputy fire chief, said the departments began preparing for the full-scale exercise back in March.

“(The training) gets our first responders actually onto their airfield, so they get to see that, and it’s a chance for all of us and our mutual aid partners to actually work together and see how things would actually work if we were to have an emergency in the jetport,” Cenate said.

Cenate said that past drills have revealed difficulties in finding a water supply on the airfield and transporting such a large group of people out of harm’s way, aspects he hoped would be improved this year.

“None of the victims are real, so that obviously helps, but even just having that mental picture of what it would look like to see 70 or 80 people injured out on the airfield is not an easy thing,” Cenate said.

There were no disruptions to flights or airport operations during the drill, Sundquist said, and street signs warned commuters about the heightened emergency vehicle presence in the area.