Around 30,000 crashes happen in Nebraska each year. To help prevent some of these crashes, particularly among teens, the Yutan Volunteer Fire Department set up a mock accident at the high school on Wednesday, Mar. 25.

“It was designed just as we have seen many crashes before, and working closely with the hospital they helped create the injuries of each kid as they see where they are placed and used from data they have,” fire chief Matt Thompson said. “It’s not only a great objective for kids to see, but it’s also great for everyone involved for training.”

Thompson first approached principal Stefanie Novotny about the idea early in the school year, and she agreed that it could be beneficial.

“I thought that it would be a good exercise for our students to understand the risks and consequences of driving impaired or not paying attention. I wanted our students to understand what the unintentional consequences also could be and how an accident can impact an entire family,” Novotny said.

Because there were so many moving pieces, from faking the injuries to getting the wrecked cars, the planning started in the fall.

“We settled on a day, and then Matt Thompson did a lot of the organizing with the different agencies that would be a part of the mock accident,” Novotny said. “We had planning meetings, met with the student and parent volunteers and talked through logistics to ensure that we all knew what was happening and what needed to be set up for it to be realistic.”

There were around 75 people involved in setting up the crash according to Thompson, which included the Yutan fire department, police department and rescue squad; Saunders County dispatch, sheriff, coroner and county attorney; Children’s Nebraska Hospital; student and parent volunteers to be victims and others that assisted. 

Once the crash was in place, the students were dismissed to the high school parking lot to witness the 1:05 p.m. drunk-driving-related accident call from the beginning.

“Fire and law enforcement responded accordingly. They had to extricate patients out of the vehicles with the jaws of life and cutters, law enforcement arrested an individual and even the morgue had to come and haul away one of the fatalities. There was also a patient that was life-flighted from the scene,” Thompson said.

Although it was a fake scene, the effects felt real on the students acting, including freshman Jocelyn Sutter, who had the role of someone in the car who was not physically hurt but was very emotional.

“During the scene, I was actually shaking because it felt so real that it left an impact on me. Since I was already freaking out during the scene, it made me think what would happen if I actually got hit in a crash,” Sutter said.

While Sutter and a couple others in the scene didn’t have large injuries, junior Ella Henkel had an abdominal bruise and had to be “life-flighted” from the school. Children’s Nebraska flew in a helicopter that the student body got to see land in the parking lot and take Henkel for a ride.

“Having real-life injuries and people doing CPR on me felt surreal and kind of like I was in a movie,” Ella Henkel said. “Flying in the helicopter was also a really cool experience and really fun to see everything from above.”

Parents of the student volunteers were also involved in the mock accident, including Yutan’s business manager Kim Henkel, mother of Ella and Otto.

“The effects of the mock accident were profoundly real for me as a parent. Although I was aware it was not real, the anticipation of whether my children were okay was agonizing. I allowed myself to experience the emotions I know I would feel if this were truly happening,” Henkel said.

Both the injuries and the emotions shown by the student and parent volunteers had an effect on those watching.

“For me, having the parents on scene really heightened the emotion because not only do I have my own kids that I want to stay safe, but I feel like my students are my ‘kids’ in a way and it would be devastating to have something like this happen to any of them,” English teacher Ginger Eikmeier said.

Once the rescue department addressed the scene, the student body was brought into the gym, where Children’s Nebraska had set up a mock trauma bay to show what happens when patients arrive at the emergency room. After they treated the participants, guest speakers from the sheriff’s office, county attorney’s office, Nebraska Safety Council and Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) also spoke about personal experiences with distracted driving. 

“Personally, I had a very strong and emotional reaction to the guest speakers because of the death of my own dad. It was really tough knowing other people have experienced similar if not worse situations than me,” senior Allison Kirchmann said. “I hope that people understand just how fast life can change and how fast death can take someone from you.”

Both the accident scene and speakers were equally impactful and eye-opening.

“I thought they did a really good job with how realistic it was, and I think it got the point across that distracted driving is dangerous,” senior Mackenzie Govier said.

This mock accident left an impression on not only the witnesses but also the student volunteers.

“Being involved in a mock crash accident had a strong impact on me because it made the dangers of reckless driving feel real instead of just something people talk about,” Sutter said. “It also made me feel emotional and think about how those situations affect not just the people involved but their families too.”

Overall, those involved felt the mock accident reached the students and staff in the right way.

“Mock accidents are important in schools because they make the consequences of risky behavior—especially impaired or distracted driving—feel real and immediate in a way that lectures alone usually can’t,” Novotny said. “They’re effective because they turn an abstract warning into something vivid, emotional and memorable.”