WATCH: Police practise response to 'major terrorist attack' in Sydney
Armed with fake guns, NSW police carried out a mock terrorist attack at Sydney's Central Station on Tuesday night, where two armed offenders "attacked" commuters on a passenger train.
Confronting footage from the police response to the simulated Tuesday night attack shows bodies littered through the station as police hunt the attackers.
About 160 emergency services personnel participated in the overnight exercise at Central Railway Station, responding to the training situation where people were "shot and stabbed" with replica guns and knives.
The major Active Armed Offender Training Exercise involved personnel from the NSW Police Force, Transport, Fire & Rescue, and Ambulance.
Exercise Pantograph tested the co-ordination and response arrangements to a terrorist or high-risk incident, police said.
“Recent incidents such as the attack on London Bridge and the Borough Market, and the attacks at the Bataclan theatre in Paris, have shown us that armed terrorists can strike anywhere at any time," Commander of the Counter Terrorism and Special Tactics Command, Assistant Commissioner Mark Murdoch said.
"We know that the threat is probably greater now than it has even been.
"We've learnt, we've watched what's happened overseas and we are preparing ourselves to respond to these types of incidents should the worst happen," he said.
“We know that the target for mass casualty terrorist attacks are crowded places. We've seen it overseas and it is unfortunately only a matter of time before we see it in Australia."
The Assistant Commissioner cited five terrorist attacks in Australia since 2014, and 13 "disruptions" as evidence police needed to be prepared.
"As much as I would like to say we've seen the worst of it I can't," he said.
Frontline officers in the exercise were armed with semi-automatic pistols.
For now only elite police officers in the riot squad are undergoing training to use high-powered M4 machine guns on the job.
The Assistant Commissioner was hopeful of a broader rollout of long-arm weapons "in time".
With AAP.
