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CERT Meeting Notes for May 13, 2003 Note: Thank you to the 15 people who attended this month’s meeting. Next Meeting: Tuesday, June 10th. Time and location will be determined at a later date. The June meeting will be hosted by Les Lowman who will cover Fire Safety and how and when to use what type of extinguishers. If you have any questions, call Les at 767-1401. Meeting Highlights The communications drill was a great success. CERT members got hands-on experience using the Command Center Station and observing how to use the base-station radio, currently monitored by Security for emergencies. Many thanks to Dave McCarthy and John Stratton for preparing the drill and also special thanks to Charlie Clark and Sergeant Woody for their expert coaching in radio use, communications, tracking CERT members on the station, and decision making. Our surprise guest was Capt. Tim Martin of the Volusia County Fire/Rescue. Tim will be replacing Capt. Gillespie who will be retiring next month. Capt. Martin will be the contact for future training sessions. He did contact Alexis and they are not able to do a session at this time. They agreed the fall would be best for another try. An extensive debriefing and discussion followed the communications drill. Some of the topics included: - How will people be assigned to handle the command center in the event of an emergency? - It was suggested that if Security contacts the zones (if possible), they could ask those contacted to the back gate to set up the command center. These people will most likely come out of zones close to back gate, but it may also depend on availability of people and access to the area. - It’s clear it will take about 4 people to man the command post. § 1 –Director§ 1 – radio§ 1 – manage board§ 1 – log info. on tracking sheets- Anyone feeling unqualified to handle any of these command center positions should let Security know if asked. It was demonstrated in the drill that the "director" and the radio person need to be take charge decision makers. - Person managing the board needs to have good hearing. - Some magnets on the board need to have color so that they stand out better against the map. - Need magnet strips with "All Clear" wording to put in cleared zones. - Local Emergency Evacuation locations will be posted on our Website as soon
as the county comes out with them. - The back gate generator needs to be checked now. Those interested in doing
this should contact Sergeant Woody to get together and test the generator. It
was suggested that the power at the back gate be shut off and see if the
generator can handle it. - Oil and gas for the generator should be stored with the generator now that
hurricane season is here. - Communication overlap between those people reporting status on our radios
is a given and there is nothing that can be done to prevent it since people will
not always be able to hear others talking due to weak range. - It was suggested that we purchase a few five-mile range radios (one for each zone). (These units require FCC License and fee. A volunteer needed to investigate License fee and registration.) Dave McCarthy has a couple of these radios and was willing to test them to see how they might work for us. - Alternatives to using the back gate were discussed. If the back gate became unusable, we could: - Use the CERT tent or a larger tent from Wings and Wheels (currently stored in Mike and Cherie Keemar’s hangar). - A private hangar (several CERT members have hangars). - All CERT members need to think of themselves as leaders in the event untrained people show up to assist. - CERT members do not have approval to go on runway at any time. - Richard Becker will be setting up a joint meeting between the airport committee and CERT. - Capt. Tim Martin had the following observations: - Make sure Command Central knows who is in the zones. - Pace – fast and furious during emergency and 4 people is the right number for staffing command center. - Board was great – suggested we highlight letters representing zones to match colors of magnets for each zone. More magnets for damage, fire, fire, injuries etc. - Someone with good hearing to handle the board. - Do we have capability to shut down road near back gate in event of disaster? - County radio will be broadcasting as well. - Will residents come to Security gates for information? How will we manage them? May need 5th person for crowd control and to answer questions in addition to security staff. - Person on radio will have to take command of those in the Zones in order to pace the information coming in. - Field updates to command are critical. - If we evacuate – Capt. Martin suggested we take our CERT gear (especially ID) with us so we might get access back into area sooner to assist.
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