FIREFIGHTERS from around Europe battled the aftermath of a natural disaster in Bury last week.

Thankfully, it was only a simulation, designed to help train firefighters in how to deal with the aftermath of an earthquake.

Crews from France and Iceland, along with those from Greater Manchester, descended on the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service Training and Safety Centre in Wellington Street, to take part in around 20 different scenarios over two days, ranging from arriving in another country and transporting equipment, to detecting and rescuing injured people from wreckage.

The training day started at 2pm on Thursday, and included scenarios such as collapsed multi-storey car parks and supermarkets which had people buried underneath them.

Greater Manchester Fire & Rescue team are one of 15 teams that form the UK International Search and Rescue Team (UK-ISAR).

This means they respond to international disasters on behalf of the government and are on call at all times.

A number of simulated earthquake sites can be found across Europe and teams from different countries are invited to come and participate in training sessions at them.

Group manager Dean Nankivell said: “We build up these scenarios as though there has been a real earthquake.

“I have been out on earthquakes in Haiti and New Zealand, but this is the first time some of these guys have done anything like this.

“One of the reasons we do this is so that if they do have to be sent to deal with an earthquake, they have this experience to look back on and use.”

Franck Fiorelli, who was in charge of a crew from Nice, had recently returned from Saint Martin in the Caribbean, where he had been deployed to deal with the aftermath of Hurricane Irma.

He said: “For my team, this is the first time some of them have done this sort of thing and they are learning a lot.

“We are being well hosted by the local fire men from Greater Manchester.”