Centerville CERT Disaster Exercise

OK the big day came a couple weeks back, and I got to participate in our ARES portion of Centerville’s disaster simulation. We pretended half our mountain slid down into the town (not far-fetched – in ‘82 this very thing happened; a boulder the size of a house ended up in the center of town – 15 blocks from the edge of town!).

ARES was called in to provide communications. My team (I was paired up with an Elmer, Joe) was assigned to a CERT station where 20 CERT volunteers were to treat 25 simulated victims. Check out this photo from the Deseret News: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705341154/Mock-disaster-eye-opening-for-Centerville-responders.html?pg=1

We got there a bit early and were quickly set up and running. I had a few issues – first of all, the organization was using multiple signs for us. Sometimes we were Island View Park, sometimes Island View ARES, sometimes ARES, sometimes Island View CERT and sometimes just CERT. Toward the end of the exericse I asked and got clarification: we were simply CERT. That would be fine except that, in a real emergency, there’s bound to be multiple CERT stations.

Here’s my log (I logged 90% of my calls) just for your interest:

0820	CERT leader requested 20 CERT volunteers (simulating a newly-discovered cache of victims)
0822	ELC confirmed request of 20 CERT volunteers
0840	2 CERT volunteers arrived
0845	1 more CERT volunteer
0850	Confirmed to ELC 2 volunteers and 1 more CERT volunteer arrived
0900	Confirmed arrival of 3 more volunteers. Agreed with ELC to call in every 5 min rather than at the arrival of every volunteer
0905	2 more cert have arrived
0905	Notified ELC that the CERT volunteers were given wrong instructions (map wrong)
0910	12 cert, of a requested 20
0915	CERT ran out of blankets. 25 victims total. ELC asked me to confirm – was the request for more blankets real, or part of the simulation (most of the victims were mad when I told him we needed more blankets for real, but for the simulation we could do without—they were cold)
0915-0945	Various calls answering status
1000	Simulation declared over, Net shut down

My Elmer was fantastic—Joe just stepped to the side and walked me through things, but he let me run the show. I learned a lot. The CERT leader and I chatted afterward and realized that he and I should be joined at the hip (much like on the field of battle – radio man needs to be RIGHT THERE at ALL TIMES).

The feedback we put together for CERT:

• No one had a backboard. Most of the injuries discovered were of a nature that they required a backboard, but no one came ready. There are, apparently, some 30 CERT backboards somewhere in the city.
• Insufficient supplies, especially sleeping bags.
• CERT people requested medical refresher courses
• Also requested a flipchart. There’s no hierarchy in CERT (because it’s all voluntary and you never know who’ll respond). A flipchart of steps to take (picking a leader, setting up a triage arrangement, etc.) would be great.
• CERT leader forgot to put his strip of tape on his hat—makes it difficult to locate him.
• ARES needs to be ID’d, I probably should have asked for the CERT leader and identified myself.
• Send people out to search for victims, but keep a few back to triage as they come in.
• The city called out the reserve medical corps, but when the volunteers arrived at the check-in point, they were sent home (they ‘did their part). CERT would have loved to have their feedback on how to treat, etc.

Take-aways for me:

• That ready kit had better be ready
• It was difficult to keep pulling off my glove to write – maybe have warm gloves for a winter response, but have a right glove I can write with
• Keep watch on the surface so I can see
• Small notebook was a good log, but the notebook was too big. Need a smaller one
• Multiple pens. I had two, one died. Many CERT people showed up w/o pens—shoulda had something to loan.
• Put a flag on my antenna. I have a tall (30”) antenna which sticks out of my camelbak, which is my ready kit. A flag on the end of it would help people find me.
• I messed around with the lock on my radio – I set it to lock everything, so I wasn’t able to transmit. In the ‘rush’ of getting going, I then enabled Internet mode on my radio, so every time I keyed the mike, I sent tones. Had to turn that off too! Be familiar with your radio, and have the lock settings where they’re useful.

All in all, this was a really cool experience. I hope there’s never an emergency I have to respond to, but I am glad I’ll be ready if there is one. You never know when you’re going to respond—all those nets, all that time on the air broadcasting can serve to help.

For instance, because I was familiar with my radio and no longer very shy, I was able to render assistance about 6 weeks ago when I was climbing on Mt. Timpanogos. I’ll post an article about that experience shortly, but suffice it to say that all of the Timp Emergency Response Team had left for the day (for the season, in fact) when a young guy sliced his toe to the bone. Not only were my hiking partner and I prepared with first aid kits, I had my radio and I had already asked about the frequency. We were able to patch the guy up AND keep TERT up to date on the incident.

So get out there and get busy. Use your radio, get familiar with it. Learn as much as you can, so when you’re needed, you’ll be ready.