Early Saturday morning, bodies were strewn across a tarmac at Dulles International Airport. Victims lay bleeding, crying for help. Smoke streamed up from a small plane. A bus lay on its side. Rescue workers covered the area, lights flashing.
But not everything was what it seemed at the airport, May 5. The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority was holding a full-scale emergency drill, using 150 volunteers and rescue workers from the Airports Authority and Loudoun, Fairfax and Prince William counties.
"We hold this once every three years," Courtney Prebich, media relations manager for the Airports Authority, said. "The FAA requires that major airports do full-scale emergency drills. That means we have patients, firefighters, ambulances and police. We try to make it as realistic as possible."
— Erika Jacobson