EMERGENCY services staged a mock terrorist attack at the site of next year’s Olympic Sailing events.

A team of actors at the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy played out scenes where they were falling ill due to breathing in chemicals.

A suspected bomb was also part of the drama at Osprey Quay.

Emergency chiefs said it was a successful multi-agency training session and that lessons will be learnt after communication problems led to a 53-minute delay in the arrival of the police.

Firefighters were greeted by men, women and children coughing and spluttering at the academy with many playing the role of foreign nationals unable to speak English.

As the number of those infected grew decontamination tents were set up for the victims to undress in and be hosed down.

And as the drama unfolded more actors arrived at Dorset County Hospital pretending to be ill with some areas taking part in a “lock-down” exercise to ensure the hospital remained uncontaminated.

Home Office officials were among those invited to watch the drama at the sailing academy yesterday.

They watched as firefighters calmed the victims down and used display cards to communicate with them.

Bob Hark, Dorset Fire and Rescue’s exercise director, said he was happy with the way the services had worked together and how the practice will help them plan ahead.

He said: “I’m really pleased with the level of involvement from all the emergency services.

“It’s been really successful in demonstrating where we work well together but also highlighting a small number of areas where we could improve our communication procedures.

He added: “There can be improvements with communications because particularly in the early stages there was a delay to the exercise that was not insurmountable and we still achieved all our objectives.”

As it was a training exercise police control room staff were left free to continue their usual responsibilities.

Chief Superintendent David Griffith, head of Dorset Police’s Olympic planning team at Portland, agreed it was a success.

He said the delay was caused when the seriousness of the reported incident led to the first line of response being bypassed.

A bomb disposal team was among those called out.

He said: “If we didn’t come away with a list of things to look at I would be disappointed.”

He added: “The more we work together the better we get.”