Community
20 May, 2026
Training day success
EMERGENCY Services came together for an emergency management training day which was held in Port Campbell and Princetown on Monday, May 11.
The initiative was the brainchild of Port Campbell Police Acting Sergeant Troy Beames with the assistance of members from Corangamite and Warrnambool Police stations, Water Police and the Police Search and Rescue unit.
The training day was born from feedback received at an emergency services conference which was held in Port Campbell in December, where all agencies expressed a keen willingness and desire to participate in more inter-agency training events.
The morning session, held at the Port Campbell Surf Life Saving Club (SLSC), consisted of a tabletop exercise involving a multi-agency critical incident response scenario.
The scenario involved a helicopter ditching into coastal waters with multiple people onboard during challenging weather conditions along a difficult to access section of the coast.
As the scenario evolved over a couple of hours, participants investigated how local emergency services and volunteer agencies would work together in response to such an incident with discussions occurring around each agency’s resources, response times and technical capabilities.
After lunch participants gathered at the Gibson Steps car park in Princetown where they undertook a joint-training exercise in the use of critical incident multi-agency radio channels and conducting incident management meetings.
Further practical training took place on the beach with Ambulance Victoria (AV) and Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) members treating casualties and Port Campbell State Emergency Service (SES) performing a high angle rescue of a patient, extracting them from the beach and up the sheer cliff face to the car park area.
“I was humbled by the response to the training day, with so many agencies providing their resources and volunteers giving up their time to make this an incredibly successful event,” Act Sgt Troy Beames said.
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“We live in an area where we are quite isolated from many emergency service resources, so we rely heavily on our local volunteer agencies when a critical incident occurs.
“An event like this really highlights how fortunate our local community is to be served by so many skilled, dedicated and selfless volunteers.
“I couldn’t be more impressed by the capabilities that were displayed throughout the training sessions by the volunteer members of the SES, CERT, Country Fire Authority (CFA), Surf Life Saving Clubs, Coast Guard and Marine Rescue Service.”
There were over 80 attendees throughout the day’s training activities which included both frontline and senior management representation from Victoria Police including local uniform, Water Police and Search And Rescue units, as well as AV, CERT, Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS), SES, CFA, Fire Rescue Victoria, Life Saving Victoria, Surf Life Saving Clubs (SLSC) including Port Campbell, Warrnambool and Port Fairy, Warrnambool Coast Guard, Port Fairy Marine Rescue, Parks Victoria, Great Ocean Road Coast and Parks Authority (GORCAPA) and Corangamite Shire.
“The highlight of the day for me was watching the Port Campbell SES volunteers perform a high angle rescue demonstration up the cliff at Gibson Steps,” Act Sgt Troy Beames said.
“I know the local members put in a lot of hard work in the lead up to the training day and the demonstration showed what a highly skilled and well-oiled machine the unit is.
“I want to thank all the agencies and participants involved in the day, especially Port Campbell SLSC for providing the venue and to Parks Victoria and GORCAPA for allowing us to undertake the training activities at Gibson Steps.
“The feedback I received is that the event has increased each emergency service agencies’ understanding of each other’s roles and capabilities and I am confident that this will improve our interoperability and service to the community when we next respond to a multi-agency critical incident.”
Read More: Port Campbell, Princetown