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TRAINING AND EXERCISES

Training and exercises built from the plan you would actually use.

Sinkaos turns a real mission plan into an exercise, marks everything in it as training, and keeps every attempt so you can compare them. TRAIN sits between RESOURCE and EXECUTE in the Sinkaos loop, and what an exercise finds goes back into your world model.

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WHERE THIS FITS IN THE LOOP
How the loop works →
  1. PREPARE
  2. TRAIN
  3. LEARN
  4. CHANGE THE WORLD MODEL
THE EXERCISE TODAY

The exercise happens once, and the report goes in a folder.

The scenario is written in a document that has already drifted from the live plan. Someone on the control team reads injects from a spreadsheet, evaluators keep their notes in a notebook, and the radio traffic sounds much like the real thing, so anyone joining late has to ask. A few weeks on, a report lists what went wrong. Six months later the plan is unchanged and the next exercise finds the same gap.

In England and Wales, the plans of general Category 1 responders must provide for exercises and for training, so that the plan is effective (regulation 25 of the 2005 Contingency Planning Regulations). GOV.UK guidance adds that plans should state the nature and frequency of both. The UK Resilience Academy’s non-mandatory Exercising Best Practice Guidance covers the range from a table top exercise to a full LIVEX. How a finding reaches the plan is left to each organisation.

A FLOOD EXERCISE

One flood exercise, from the real plan to the changed plan.

  1. Week 1
    The plan becomes a scenario
    The exercise lead turns the care home evacuation plan into a training scenario. The original plan stays as it was. She splits the scenario into four segments: briefing, staging, ground floor evacuation and handover to the rest centre.
    ScenariosSegments
  2. Week 4
    The site moves to a training ground
    The care home cannot host the exercise, so its staging area, entrance, stairs and rooms are mapped onto a fire station drill yard. Signal there is poor, so the scenario, maps, people and injects go into a training pack that runs on a local network.
    Different venueOffline exercises
  3. Sat 09:00
    Training mode goes on
    Every screen shows that this is training, and simulated events cannot trigger real actions. The instructor runs the scenario, two evaluators assess, and the safety officer holds separate controls to pause or abort.
    Training modeRoles
  4. Sat 10:40
    An inject forces the branch
    The instructor injects a flooded access road and stands in for the ambulance service, which is not taking part. The team has to find the alternative route, and the scenario branches.
    InjectsBranches
  5. Sat 11:30
    Reset and run it again
    The ground floor took too long. The instructor resets that segment and reruns it with a different team leader. Both attempts are kept, with timing, routes, tasks and interventions side by side.
    Reset and retryCompare attempts
  6. Week 6
    The finding changes the plan
    The evaluation shows the stairs as the bottleneck, with the evidence attached. In LEARN the finding gets an owner. In CHANGE THE WORLD MODEL it proposes a second evacuation chair on the kit list and a new step in the plan.
    EvaluationLessons
Mission plan of a demo flood exercise: a checklist of plan parts, a search area split into four sectors on the map, and a table of mission pack status for each member.
The plan of a flood exercise. Demo data.
IN THE EXERCISE

Exercise management tools for instructors, evaluators and trainees.

Training mode

Clearly marked exercises where simulated events can’t be mistaken for real ones or trigger real actions.

Scenarios from real plans

Turn a mission plan into a scenario without changing the original.

Repeatable segments

Practise, simulate, brief or skip each part. Reset a segment and run it again.

Different venue

Map the real site onto a training ground, down to the staging area, entrance, stairs and room.

Injects and branches

Inject events, stand in for missing people or systems, and branch the scenario.

Separate roles

Instructor, evaluator, observer and safety each get their own controls.

Evaluation with evidence

Assess against clear criteria and keep the proof, so nobody is reduced to a single score.

AFTER THE EXERCISE

What you can show afterwards, and where it comes from.

QUESTIONIN A REPORT AND A NOTEBOOKIN SINKAOS
Did we exercise the plan we would really use?If someone compared themThe scenario is made from the plan
Was the second attempt better?Memory and a stopwatchTiming, routes, tasks and interventions across runs
Who moved where?Usually lostReal movement against the planned route, including floors and rooms
What is the assessment based on?An evaluator’s notesClear criteria, with evidence
Did the finding change anything?Depends who follows upLessons with an owner, and proposed changes to plans, training and kit
WORTH KNOWING

What training in Sinkaos does not do.

It does not simulate water or crowds
Sinkaos is not a physics or crowd simulator. Injects are events you prepare or add during play, and judgement stays with the instructor.
Safety stays with your people
Pause and abort keep a real emergency apart from the scenario. Your risk assessment, your safety officer and your agreed call for a real emergency still come first.
A pass in Sinkaos is your own record
Qualifications issued in Sinkaos record what your organisation decided. Whether a course meets an awarding body’s standard is for you to confirm.
It supports your duties
Sinkaos helps you plan exercises and keep the record of them. Whether your programme meets your legal duties is for you and your local resilience forum to judge.
WHAT IT FITS

Exercises and courses it fits.

Flood and evacuation rehearsalsMulti-agency live exercisesEvent rehearsalsDrill nights at on-call stationsSearch team drillsSite familiarisationFirst aid coursesRadio procedure courses
QUESTIONS

Questions about training and exercises.

Can a simulated event set off something real?
Training mode is built to prevent that. Exercises are clearly marked, and simulated events can’t be mistaken for real ones or trigger real actions.
What happens if a real emergency starts during an exercise?
The safety role can pause or abort, and those controls keep the real emergency clearly separate from the scenario.
Can we exercise somewhere without internet?
Yes. A training pack holds the scenario, maps, people and injects, and runs on a local network.
Does it suit a table top exercise?
Yes, for the parts you only want to talk through: each segment can be briefed or simulated instead of practised. Our table top exercise guide covers how to run one with or without software.
How do findings get back into the plan?
The debrief is built from the record. Findings become lessons with an owner, scope and status, and lessons can propose changes to plans, training, equipment, staffing, routes and maps. Qualifications from the session feed the compliance matrix.

Sources

  1. The Civil Contingencies Act 2004 (Contingency Planning) Regulations 2005, regulation 25
  2. GOV.UK: Preparation and planning for emergencies
  3. UK Resilience Academy: Exercising Best Practice Guidance
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