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The weather was not cooperating. It has been raining heavily for the past several days and it is expected to continue.

City Manager Rod Swope has declared an emergency. The city immediately set up an emergency operations center at the Juneau Police Department building.

That was the scenario the city created to test its ability to respond to catastrophes. On Wednesday the city began exercises that are scheduled to run over 10 days.

Juneau is participating in Alaska Shield/Northern Edge '05, a statewide natural disaster and terrorism response exercise. Anchorage, Fairbanks, Ketchikan, Whittier and other cities across the state also are in the exercise.

"The exercises are designed as a learning tool," said Michael Patterson, the city's emergency programs manager. "It's a way for us to interact and learn what our roles and capabilities are."

Swope said he expects the exercises to expose problems that would occur in a real disaster.

On Wednesday, directors and staff of city departments were divided into five teams, each wearing jackets of different colors.

The green team dealt with legal issues. The orange team, made up of the fire and police departments, helped get information from the field to the emergency operations center.

The yellow team figured out how to transport supplies to the field. The burgundy team, led by Finance Director Craig Duncan, tracked all the purchases. The blue team, staffed by public works and community development directors, prioritized the cleanup efforts and planned for what might be needed.

Swope wore a white jacket identifying him as the incident commander.

As the day progressed, the city asked the state to contact the Federal Aviation Administration to fix Juneau International Airport's runway lighting. Cruise ships would bypass Juneau.

Eric Mohrmann, chief of Capital City Fire and Rescue, said it was helpful to conduct the exercise with other city departments.

"We are used to doing things our way," Mohrmann said. "By having the exercise together, we can integrate the information and create better communication flow."

Michael Swainson, acting chief of emergency medical services from Yukon Territory, came to Juneau to evaluate the exercise. He said the city's overall response was good but could improve.

Swainson suggested the city manager hold his briefing with only directors from the five groups instead of briefing the whole emergency operations center.

"In real life, the phones will ring off the hook," Swainson said. "They cannot stop their work for the briefing."

On Thursday, Bartlett Regional Hospital tested its ability to respond to mass casualties.

In the scenario, the Federal Building collapsed during the earthquake. Forty-five victims were on their way to the hospital. Twenty-two patients from elsewhere already had been sent to the hospital.

Medical staff from Bartlett sorted out patients in front of the hospital and sent them to take an X-ray or undergo surgery, based on their condition, which was written on a card the mock patients carried around.

The patients' conditions ranged from head injuries to a premature birth. Three people died.

Carlene Bergquist, program and service manager of the American Red Cross of Alaska's Southeast District, was one of the volunteers who pretended to be patients.

"My situation was that I fainted from too much excitement," Bergquist said. "They brought a chair for me to lie down on so I didn't need to lie down on the pavement."

Bergquist said the exercise could have been a little bit more real if they had applied some makeup to simulate injuries.

"They would have responded more quickly instead of reading the cards we had," Bergquist.

Swainson agreed.

"If the patients had looked more real, the medical staff's response would have been more real," Swainson said.

• I-Chun Che can be reached at ichun.che@juneauempire.com.