Successful rescue ops after ‘drone strike’ on Mandovi bridge
Staff Reporter
Panaji
Three civilians were ‘rescued’ from Mandovi River in Panaji by fire services personnel on Wednesday during ‘Operation Abhyaas’, a mock exercise conducted as part of the nationwide drill in view of ‘new and complex threats’ that have emerged amid rising tensions with Pakistan.
As part of the drill, a scenario was created describing one of the Mandovi bridges had collapsed due to an aerial or drone strike, and vehicles along with civilians had fallen in the water.
“Within five minutes of the alert, the fire and emergency team reached the designated place – ferry wharf Panaji. We had received information around 4.15 pm, and subsequently it was relayed to the police, fire and other agencies,” said incident commander and Deputy Collector (revenue) Vinayak Chari.
He said that as part of the drill, search and rescue operation was successfully conducted at the ferry wharf. “The main purpose of the mock drill was to train the volunteers from the Civil Defence, NCC and NSS students on how to respond in such situations,” said Chari.
He said there were around 150 participants.
‘Operation Abhyaas’ was carried out across the country at 244 locations, and both districts of Goa were part of the drill. The Civil Defence Mock Drill was held in North Goa at Indian National Watersports Centre, Miramar, Panaji Ferry Wharf and Goa Glass Fibre Ltd,
Colvale.
Ishwar Madkaikar, deputy collector and incident commander at the Indian National WaterSports Centre, Miramar said that this is the first time such a security related mock drill has been conducted. “Our main objective is to use the capacity of the local citizens.”