Two prisoners escape from the detention center in Swidnica, take two hostages with them and start a fire in the Church of Peace, which is holding a mass for 50 people. On-site the firemen, police, prison guards, ambulance services and the city guards all appear immediately.
This is not an action movie screenplay, but in fact the rescue scenario that pupils from Liceum nr 3 (Secondary School no 3) also took part in.
“The only chance of saving the church is an immediate action.(…) The same rescue operation we did 10 years ago. At that time there was no system for warning of a fire and there were no fire roads either”, said senior foreman Tomasz Szuszwalak, the chief fire officer of the PSP (State Fire Service) in Swidnica.
Since then fire roads have been built and the entire electrical system has been replaced. There is also a caretaker looking after the building. On top of that, an extremely sensitive VESDA fire suppression system was installed in 2006 and will be modernized under the project “Lutheran Enclave”.
The rescue action carried out on Saturday, the 26th of September was attended by the State Fire Service as well as the Voluntary Fire Service from Swidnica, Jawor and Sroda Slaska. During the rescue operation cannons were used for the first time. They performed the task very well – reaching the highest parts of the church with the water jet.
