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Falls Church Academy became the scene of a simulated catastrophe May 22 as students confronted a school bus crash, dozens of mock injuries and the demands of a large-scale emergency response.
The academy’s fourth annual Mass Casualty Incident Simulation brought together students from healthcare, public safety, language and science programs. The cross-curricular exercise tested skills they had developed throughout the school year in a realistic, fast-moving crisis.
Organizers create a different scenario annually so students cannot predict what they will face. This year’s exercise centered on a passenger vehicle T-boning a school bus.
Criminal Justice students arrived first, securing the area, collecting evidence and apprehending the car’s driver on suspicion of impaired driving. After they declared the scene safe, EMT students were dispatched to triage victims and provide initial care based on the severity of their injuries.
Patients were then moved into the academy wing, which had been converted into a mock hospital staffed by students from several healthcare programs.
Before the exercise, students from Exploring Health Sciences, Vietnamese and American Sign Language courses received cards describing their characters, injuries and personal details. Community Emergency Response Team volunteers used professional moulage makeup to create realistic bleeding, impalements, bruises and other wounds.
“The victims all look like victims,” Lintott said. “They’re bleeding, they’ve got impalements—all sorts of things. So they truly look like they’ve been injured.”
Based on their observable conditions, patients were sent to appropriate treatment rooms. Students from Introduction to Nursing, Medical Assistant, Patient Care Technician, Practical Nursing, Dental Careers and Pharmacy Technician programs provided care.
The exercise included a range of cases so every discipline could participate. Some patients needed assessment and emergency treatment for dental injuries. Others received medications or had prescriptions filled after medical evaluations.
Students also practiced procedures including administering IVs. A pregnant patient was incorporated into the scenario, allowing participants to assist with a simulated delivery using a birthing mannequin.
Biotechnology Foundations students performed diagnostic work behind the scenes. They conducted ethanol blood testing to determine the suspected impaired driver’s blood alcohol concentration and communicated their findings to the Criminal Justice program. Other patients required Troponin T testing, which is used to identify heart damage.
Organizers deliberately added communication barriers. Some American Sign Language and Vietnamese students portrayed patients who were deaf or primarily spoke Vietnamese, while others served as interpreters between patients and medical teams.
The setup gave healthcare students experience navigating communication challenges they could encounter professionally while allowing language students to use their skills in a practical setting. Language students also contributed to the exercise through a simulated live news broadcast from the crash scene, including interpretations.
“It’s really just the incorporation and the overlap of the curricula that we’re fortunate enough to have a demonstration like this,” Lintott said.
The simulation was repeated during first, third and fifth periods, once in each academy period, so different student groups could take part.
Lintott first proposed the event during her job interview. Her work across the academy’s programs helped her recognize an opportunity to unite its courses through one collaborative exercise.
By responding to the mock collision, students had to think quickly, communicate across specialties and confront challenges modeled on those faced by working professionals. The exercise was designed to bridge classroom instruction and hands-on experience while demonstrating how cooperation among disciplines can save lives.