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Welcome to Disaster City, where rescue workers train to save your life. This 52-acre installation on the campus of Texas A&M University is the world’s largest — and perhaps only — fake, destroyed town built for the sole purpose of training workers who save lives after mass-casualty events. Funded jointly by the federal government and state of Texas, the facility was founded to improve the realism of disaster training after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. It’s now a full-blown campus of calamity, holding classes in fallen buildings, fields of rubble and even a derailed train. “It’s organized chaos,” said Anthony Gall, an Iowa first responder who last week attended the first international exercise held at the facility. “Everything from an earthquake to an explosive detonation … they’ve tried to engineer it here.”

Welcome to Disaster City, where rescue workers train to save your life.

This 52-acre installation on the campus of Texas A&M University is the world’s largest — and perhaps only — fake, destroyed town built for the sole purpose of training workers who save lives after mass-casualty events. Funded jointly by the federal government and state of Texas, the facility was founded to improve the realism of disaster training after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. It’s now a full-blown campus of calamity, holding classes in fallen buildings, fields of rubble and even a derailed train.

“It’s organized chaos,” said Anthony Gall, an Iowa first responder who last week attended the first international exercise held at the facility. “Everything from an earthquake to an explosive detonation … they’ve tried to engineer it here.”

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    This 52-acre installation on the campus of Texas A&M University is the world’s largest — and perhaps only — fake,...
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    There’s a joke about your alma mater being the site of “disaster city” in here somewhere. I’m too tired to make it.
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    This 52-acre installation on the campus of Texas A&M University is the world’s largest — and perhaps only — fake,...
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