Valley firefighters trained for search, rescue, and recovery efforts

PHOENIX (KSAZ) - In Phoenix, the city fire department's search and rescue teams practice for difficult rescue and recovery situations, like the bridge collapse that happened in Florida on Thursday.

In fact, there is a simulated collapsed structure that first responders train with, every week.

"When people look at a pile like this, they get discouraged," said Cpt. Darrell Wiseman. "For us, we look at it and we know there are pockets in there. Even looking at the bridge that has collapsed, there's pockets in there."

The tons of rubble and vehicles can represent anything from a building or, similar to the incident in Miami, a bridge.

"You have to look at it, and you start triaging," said Cpt. Wiseman. "You look at pockets and what the potentials are."

Multiple victims have been reported from the Florida bridge collapse. Cpt. Wiseman says while the task is daunting, there's hope inside the rubble.

"We have tremendous amount of equipment that we can utilize," said Cpt. Wiseman. "We have sounding devices. We have dogs that we can access that do search, and they train on this pile right here. They're looking for live people, screaming, whimpering."

If and when similar situations happen in Arizona, statewide rapid response teams jump into action to try and save as many people as possible.

"We train every week," said Cpt. Wiseman. "Every Wednesday, our rapid response task force is out here, beating ont his pile, using the equipment, and working together as a team so we can respond to these types of incidents."