By Dennis Box-The Courier-Herald

Practice makes as perfect - or as close to perfect as possible - and that is what Sound Shake ‘08 was all about.

East Pierce Fire and Rescue along with the Bonney Lake Police Department teamed up March 5 with officials from around the area to go through a simulated natural disaster exercise.

Dave Wakefield, assistant fire chief, and Police Chief Mike Mitchell organized the event, which took place in the Public Safety building.

City officials from Bonney Lake, Sumner and the surrounding area gathered to participate in the simulation and learn their roles if a disaster strikes.

The scenario was a major earthquake had hit the Puget Sound region. A freight train and two cars were derailed and tipped over on a state Route 410 overpass near Sumner. There was a fissure open on Elhi Hill and 410 was closed. The school in Wilkeson had collapsed and numerous people were injured at the Bonney Lake Fred Meyer store.

The group was broken into sections including operations, planning, finance, logistics, public information and incident command.

Calls were coming in fast and furious for resources and the people in each group had to decide where and how to allocate resources.

“Initially everyone is overwhelmed,” Wakefield said. “It takes time to allocate resources and we try to keep this as realistic as possible.”

Mitchell said the exercise was a good way to, “figure out what is working and what isn't. When the rubber hits the road this has to work.”

Wakefield and Mitchell had been planning the event since October, deciding how to best simulate the disaster and teach the people how to respond.

“I think this exceeded our expectations in terms of earning value,” East Pierce Fire Chief Dan Packer said. “This really works. It's the first time we have brought all these agencies together and I think this is critically important. Disasters ignore boundaries and working together is what regional thinking is all about.”

Wakefield is the emergency manger for East Pierce. During breaks he quizzed the group members on their actions and led the team through various incidents.

“We tried to plug in as many things as we could,” Wakefield said. “The single most important issue that comes out of this is communication and working together.”

Dennis Box can be reached at dbox@courierherald.com.