The exercise fell on the the fifth and seventh anniversaries of actual tornado outbreaks in the area.
The Hunt County-wide disaster drill scenario included a total power and water failure of the west wing at Hunt Regional Medical Center caused by severe weather and a tornado strike at the hospital’s on-campus warehouse, according to Lisa Hill, the director of foundation development and marketing communications for Hunt Regional Healthcare.
“The result of these two occurrences were a complete evacuation of all patients from our west wing third floor, forth floor and ICU while simultaneously receiving an influx of about 35 patients from the warehouse,” Hill said. “We are so grateful to the students from the Paris Junior College nursing program and Caddo Mills and Quinlan Ford High School for acting as these patients.”
The drill utilized all Hunt Regional facilities and staff, American Medical Response ambulance service, all area law enforcement, fire/rescue, Homeland Security, Red Cross and HAM radio club.
“I feel like the exercise went really well,” said Richard Hill, Hunt County emergency management coordinator, who noted the drill was the first use of the recent agreement between Hunt County and the Texas A&M University-Commerce Department of Campus Operations and Safety to utilize the university’s Emergency Operations Center.
“And we also had representatives with us from the Texas Department of Public Safety and the University Police Department,” he said. “But this was a hospital exercise.”
Lisa Hill said the drills are effective in helping all area emergency staff be prepared for any type of disaster.
“Representatives from all agencies involved meet routinely so everyone knows the resources available and how to quickly implement the services required to take care of the health and safety of folks in the Hunt County area,” she said. “Our nursing staff really went above and beyond today as they quickly evacuated over 40 mock patients from our west wing patient rooms while also triaging and treating 35 mock patients from the tornado. We certainly hope this type of situation does not happen in real life, but we know we are prepared if it does.”
However, events were reported on the date in both 2012 and 2014.
— A total of 16 confirmed tornadoes struck North Texas on the afternoon of April 3, 2012. Tornado number six occurred near Royse City, beginning in Rockwall County before moving northeast into Hunt County. The tornado produced EF-2 damage along 3.1 mile path which was approximately 400 yards wide.
Investigators with the National Weather Service confirmed that a tornado struck the Union Valley/Royse City area, on the Hunt County side of the line. After completing a damage assessment, the tornado was rated as an F2, between 111 and 135 mph, and totally destroyed five homes along the north side of State Highway 276.
Tornado number eight was observed by law enforcement officials four miles south of Cumby, in Hunt County. This tornado produced EF-0 damage over open country along a quarter- mile path which was approximately 25 yards wide.
Tornado number 16 occurred near the community of Poetry, along the Kaufman/Rockwall/Hunt County line. Investigators believe the storm was associated with the same supercell that produced an EF-3 tornado in Forney.
— The National Weather Service concluded the 2014 tornado was an EF-1, with peak wind speeds of 110 mph, which was on the ground for 11.1 miles and had a maximum width of 750 yards. The tornado was reported to have touched down 8.5 miles northwest of Greenville at 8:02 p.m. and remained on the ground for 18 minutes, lifting off at 8:20 p.m. nine miles northeast of Greenville.
More than a dozen homes were lost to the storm, and dozens more structures were heavily damaged due to the tornado and high winds. Five people were reported to have received minor injuries.
Despite the damage, no one died during the storms.
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