What is so important in this or any natural or man-made disaster is knowing what to do when it happens.

Disaster scenarios are certainly a complex challenge, given the inordinate number of variables that could come into play.

If something unfolds during the night or during the day, or on a sleepy weekend or a flat-out pre-Christmas Saturday morning shopping session the challenges created will vary considerably.

Nevertheless, there are certainly a host of skills that those most likely to be drawn on to help in such a disaster, in addition to the usual situation of ordinary people doing their extraordinary things in a time of crisis.

If you’re a health professional you’re certainly likely to be front and centre of emergency efforts.

On that basis alone it made sense for the 180-plus delegates in Albury on Saturday for the Australian Medical Students’ Association’s Rural Health Summit to be thrown into such a situation.

It was that “earthquake” that shook them from their focus on the theories of their profession to the hands-on skills that make a difference.

The scenario, of course, could have been any manner of possibilities – fire, flood, a plane crash or even a terrorism incident.

It didn’t really matter. What did matter was that this was a test of the students’ ability to immediately switch into “emergency mode” and work with focus, co-operation, skill and in an extremely timely way.

There were the range of injuries to consider, the problems posed by some victims being trapped, a whole host of such scenarios.

As summit co-convenor Dayna Duncan pointed out, this was all in the midst of what would be a highly stressed environment, requiring the old cliches of calmness and quick thinking.

Clearly much planning went into the exercise and would not have been possible without the volunteers who put their hands up to be the “victims”.