Oklahoma Hospitals Practice For Mass-Casualty Scenario

Dozens of hospitals across the metro participated in a mass casualty drill.

The 36 hospitals from Guthrie to Purcell, Yukon to Shawnee and in between were flooded with actors portraying 250 victims involved in a pretend mass shooting.

The idea behind the drill was to make sure Oklahoma City hospitals and those around the city would be ready to handle a large-scale trauma on the scale of the 1995 bombing or bigger.

"We're not talking about if this happens. We're talking about when this happens," explained Dr. David Hogan, who knows first-hand the destruction of these situations and how important training for the next one is. "I was around during the bombing and cared for patients."

"Those of us who were involved in that, a lot of those folks have retired, moving on, and it's imperative that we continue to provide that information and that background so that the new generations of emergency health care providers, hospitals, public health providers, etc. can all be ready."

The medical professionals who set up the drill have been planning it for about a year. They researched several shootings over the last three years to determine how a mass shooting near OKC might unfold.