Emergency services were seen dealing with a major incident on Southend pier - but thankfully it was just a training exercise.

The exercise involved Southend-on-Sea Borough Council, Essex County Fire & Rescue Service, Essex Police, Her Majesty’s Coastguard, RNLI, and East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust and St John Ambulance.

The exercise will test emergency plans and major incident plans in response to a simulated emergency scenario taking place on the pier.

The council informed seafront businesses, to ensure they are aware of the operation, and asked residents not to be alarmed by the sight of emergency service vehicles, activity and white smoke on the day which could be visible from 1pm onwards.

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Councillor Andrew Moring, Executive Councillor for Corporate and Community Support, said: “It is vital and good practice for us all to test our emergency plans regularly to ensure that they are up to date, relevant and efficient for the whole Borough.

“This exercise is more around testing our response plans in general and is not the same as the Pier exercise that was held in 2005 to test specific Pier evacuation and emergency plans. However the Pier offers us all a great venue to really test what we all do, with minimum disruption to the public and local businesses.”

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