Montgomery Whitewater is scheduled to open this summer – a $65 million, 120-acre water park with ambitions to attract more than 300,000 people to Alabama’s capital every year.

But beyond the ziplines, biking trails, dining and tourism aims, there’s one other use on the horizon – surface and swift water rescue training for first responders, beginning as early as this fall.

The park, set for a soft opening around Memorial Day, will be a recirculating whitewater park with rafting, kayaking, canoeing and stand-up paddle boarding available for beginners and experts. It can also host Olympic standard competitions.

The ability to deal with submerged vehicles, sudden flooding, or search and rescue operations is a necessary part of the first responder’s skillset. Yet simulating such incidents can be challenging.

As Montgomery Fire/Rescue Special Operations Assistant Fire Chief Sam Costanza explained, his department currently trains in the Coosa River about 45 minutes drive from Montgomery. But finding terrain with the right mix of slow moving, benign water and faster water with good hydraulics isn’t easy.

When training in a natural body of water, crews are at the mercy of conditions at the site.

“The flow rate and amount of water on the Coosa is all dependent on the hydro dams, which completely dictates the flow rate,” Costanza said. “The rates you have in the morning may be completely different in the evening. When we’re in the rainy season, they could be letting out so much water it’s not even practical to train.”

Such conditions can make the training almost as dangerous as actual situations.

However, Montgomery Whitewater COO Scott Shipley said the park will allow training crews to control the water flow, simulate certain conditions, and shut off water for safety reasons. For example, a vehicle can be rolled out into the water, once its engine is removed and it is drained of fluid, to allow crews to get a feel for what’s needed.

“When you get new people out there, there’s not a lot of leash even in the training,” Shipley said. “We can create realistic scenarios and shut the water off, allow them to train in a custom environment and keep an eye on what’s going on. And there’s training at night. We can turn the pumps on, and turn the lights on if trouble comes and reset. That makes this really special.”

Crews can also receive training in low-head dam rescues, Shipley said, which can be a particularly hazardous scenario. One rescue worker in Gadsden was killed in 2015 when she was swept into a creek at a dam during a rescue. Three other rescue squad workers were injured in that incident.

It takes about five days and 40 hours of training to be certified at the technician level, Costanza said, while a three-day training is available at the operations level.

Because weather in Montgomery remains largely temperate throughout the year, the training could continue in winter months, Shipley said.

“That’s a huge impact to Montgomery. These guys are coming in, shopping, eating in restaurants, staying in hotels,” he said.