Volunteers from West Herts College will be live 'casualties' when St Albans City Hospital simulates a major incident this week.

Emergency services will be supported by specialist rescue units in the exercise on Friday, which will also involve local authorities and health organisations.

Kevin Hornett, head of emergency planning and resilience at West Hertfordshire Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “It will be a great opportunity for organisations from across Hertfordshire to come together and test our preparations for a major incident.

“As a receiving centre, our clinicians would play a major role in managing critically injured casualties and liaising with our partners in this type of situation, so this activity will enable us to see what we already do well as a group and where we could improve."

Chief Operating Officer Sally Tucker added: “These exercises are an essential part of our planning for serious and large-scale incidents and we look forward to welcoming our partner organisations for what we hope will be a very useful and productive event."

There will be no disruption to patient services and all hospital activity, including access to the site, will function as normal.