Actors add weight to child search test

Actors playing distraught relatives helped test emergency services to the limit during the first major Child Rescue Ireland (CRI) alert exercise in the Cork region.

The actors, who played the roles of a frantic mother and aunt of two children who had been taken without permission by their father, interacted with gardaí and Civil Defence units as they coordinated a detailed search of a vast exercise area east of the city.

Exercise director, Inspector Finbarr O’Sullivan, who oversaw the dramatic test in the Little Island area, said the actors added extra realism to their exercise.