Rõuge school practiced evacuation in the event of a fire in the school building during the rescue exercise.
On the morning of 27 September, an evacuation drill was conducted at Rõuge school. At 9.30 a.m., the school’s security system triggered a fire alarm, which was immediately responded to by the school’s management, teachers and the entire school family of 201 people. The teachers guided the students and school staff quickly and directly out of the school building to the assembly point in the nearby church yard. At the same time as announcing the alarm, the headmistress Annika Kuus had reported the fire on the emergency number. Rõuge volunteer firefighters responded to the fire event, arriving in three minutes. Four volunteer rescuers with two rescue vehicles, operated under the leadership of Tiit Toots, built a hose line from the fire truck to the danger cleaner’s room, i.e. the hearth of the fire, in a minute.
After the exercise, a preliminary analysis of the action took place at the school.
The evacuation drill was preceded by a rescue training for teachers on 12 September, during which 37 teachers were reminded in detail about the evacuation plan and other student safety issues.
The training and exercise were organized by the Estonian Rescue Board in cooperation with Rõuge school and Rõuge volunteer rescue command in frame of the project ROUGERESCUE (ER209) supported within the 6th Call for proposals.
Objective of the project is to increase awareness and preparedness of public authorities, institutions and local communities on environmental disasters, climate risks, natural hazards, and other related and cascade risks exposed to the society and rural communities in the border areas and to construct Rõuge rescue depot centre (II stage) for operations, services and local crises headquarters to increase capacity of rescue network and services.
