To meet the ever-broadening range of situations that firefighting personnel and emergency response providers may encounter, the Louisiana State University Fire and Emergency Training Institute (LSU-FETI), located on Nicholson Drive in Baton Rouge, is continuously expanding its facilities, trying to provide the best preparation for emergency responders and the challenges they might encounter on a call.

Prior to September 2002, the LSU-FETI had no facilities to train Louisiana firefighters and emergency response providers on how to enter, search within and remove victims from, a collapsed building. On Sept. 11, 2002, on the first anniversary of perhaps the world's most disastrous building collapses, the LSU Urban Search and Rescue facility (USAR) was dedicated.

The building, engineered by ABMB Engineers and built by James Industrial Constructors LLC, is designed to simulate the collapse of a multi-story building, teaching rescue personnel the safest methods of entering the building, shoring up the building and removing victims.

The USAR facility at LSU's FETI will be a training tool, used by the FETI instructors to better prepare fire and emergency response personnel for rescue efforts in collapsed buildings. The building footprint comprised a 40-ft. by 50-ft. area with 8-in.-thick walls, combining props of several types to create arrangements that emulate conditions encountered in "real life" collapsed building conditions.