At 2pm today the Anti-terrorist exercise held in Belconnen was scheduled to be concluded. In fact it was all over by noon, the roads reopened and the offices and shops having been reopened for hours.
Having spoken to a few of the police and emergency service personal manning various road blocks I got the impression that it was a rather dull way to earn 8 hours overtime at the Federal Govt’s expense (because there is no funds left for OT in the ACT police budget). A ABS staffer I spoke to stated he wished he turned up to work a little later to avoid a painfully slow “non-critical evacuation” which sounds like a poorly organised 1/2 hour smoke-o in the car park to me.
By 11 am the mall seemed to have been reopened for some time, having run their own evacuation earlier and although the lower level car parks were mostly full the upper level was disserted as was Myer and most of the mall until you got to the food court. Even then the few people eating was a far cry from the din usually coming from there.
So what was you Belconnen day of Mock Terror like? Did you get evacuated? Have the slowest trading day on record? Stay away from the shops because you didn’t want to get caught up in the hooha? Have a laugh at the AFP special effects budget (one smoke machine)?
Let us know and if you took any photos, send them in (mine were useless).
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