Article: Disaster city: emergency responders hone skills amid the rubble.(Homeland Security)(National Emergency Response and Rescue Training Center)

COLLEGE STATION, Texas -- Removing a one-ton jagged piece of broken concrete is not an easy task--especially when there are no cranes.

One of the first skills firefighters and other first responders learn at the National Emergency Response and Rescue Training Center is how to hoist a slab of concrete off a rubble pile using only their muscles.

They pull the concrete up "exactly the way we think the Egyptians did it," said Brian Smith, public information officer for Texas Task Force One.

They use lumber to create an A-frame around the slab, suspend the load underneath, and then use leverage to lift it off.

This is training, but in the real world, there might be ...

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