Teddy bears and friends now ready for emergency
BRING your teddy and make sure you’re ready—be it for a fire, flood or first aid.
The Teddy Bear Emergency and Whanau Fun Day held at Carisbrook School in Dunedin on Saturday aimed to familiarise children with a range of different scenarios in an enjoyable community event.
South Dunedin Community Network hosted the event.
Those taking part included the New Zealand Red Cross, Fire and Emergency New Zealand and Civil Defence Emergency Management.
Network intern and event overseer Brendan Brown said it was beneficial for children to be familiar with emergency responders in case they experienced a real emergency.
For example, South Dunedin was at risk of flooding, which could mean a Civil Defence response.
‘‘It’s finding that right balance between fun, educational and informative without being frightening,’’ he said.
Emergency vehicles were parked at the school and uniformed personnel mixed with children and adults.
Fenz set up a smoke tunnel that people could crawl through, practising so they would know what to do in a real fire.
An earthquake simulator was supplied by Civil Defence, and the Red Cross operated a teddy bear first aid station.
Inside was an obstacle course as well as a range of less physical activities, such as colouringin and a card game about what to do in different situations.