Nearly 80 firefighters battled a huge blaze at a refinery this morning, with the goal of preparing for the real thing.

What started out with a pipeline rupture at the Cotton Valley Refinery quickly turned into a massive tank explosion with more than half a dozen injured. It took dozens of firefighters from Webster and Bossier Parishes to control the blaze and save lives. Fortunately, this was only a drill.. a very important drill.

"This type of training with two major refineries within our fire district is valuable to our personnel," says Cotton Valley Assistant Fire Chief Adam Hurley.

Hurley says the majority of calls his volunteers receives are small house fires; but, it's crucial they be ready for something huge.

"This is probably one of the largest scale operations we've done in quite some time," says Serepta Assistant Fire Chief Jeff Franklin.

Franklin says he was pleased to see all the different departments work so successfully together.

"We found several things we need to work on. We found several things that we were really doing right," says Franklin.

Zack Helton with Pafford EMS says he's used to only working with one or two patients max. This drill will serve well.

"It helps us a lot because we see where we fall short on things, and we didn't actually hurt anybody. We can go back and say 'well, we can improve here and not there and not worry about loss of life'. We can just simulate it and see what we need to adjust," says Helton.

It's a tragedy these rescuers hope never happens. But, thanks to this drill, they're ready just in case it ever does.

Chief Hurley says he's very grateful to Calumet for helping to pay for some of today's training.