WATCH: High-Risk Rescue After Car Over Bridge (Simulation)

The special operations unit of the Howard County Department of Fire and Rescue Services practiced a high-risk technical rescue in which rescue personnel were lowered more than 100 feet below a Route 32 bridge near the Cedar Lane exit in Columbia.

For three hours Wednesday, rescue members strapped into climbing gear and went down below the bridge to secure a patient–another rescue member for this purpose–into a stretcher, and scaled back up to the bridge with a pulley system.

"This is critical because these types of incidents are what we determine to be very high-risk, very low-frequency in nature," said Gordon Wallace, a spokesman for the county fire and rescue service.

"The most realistic training we can get our members for this type of incident is going to be critical for them to be able to perform when it actually does happen," Wallace told Patch.

The rescue members train for this situation in smaller and more controlled areas, but allowing the personnel to go through the motions on an actual roadway makes them even more prepared, according to Wallace.

"Due to the complexity of this drill, this will be the first time in three years that HCDFRS has conducted one involving the lowering of personnel and 'mock' patients over a bridge," department officials said in a statement.

Special operations personnel conduct approximately 90 rescues per year around the county, and four of those in 2011 were technical rope rescues, according to the county fire and rescue service.

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