Joining CERT Information

It has come to this blog's attention that not everyone reading is familiar with CERT's sign up procedure.

This came to my attention via a comment left on one of my posts - which this blog, I'm embarrassed to admit, bungled in its handling.  I first published the comment intending to answer publicly.  But then realized that the writer had put her email address in it and might not wish to have that published.  So I then deleted it from the blog - not realizing that it was my last copy of her email address.  My apologies to the writer for not sending this via email directly to you!

The fastest way to get general information about CERT San Diego, including how to join, can be found at the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department webpage for the City of San Diego.

Briefly though, you must live within the city limits of San Diego (this does not include Chula Vista, Del Mar, Poway, or Imperial Beach, for instance) OR you must be employed by a company with a physical business address in the City of San Diego.

Next, you need to attend one of the CERT Academies which usually take place several times a year.  After completion, you will be able to join the local CERT meetings and meet your fellow team members.

The webpage is located at www.sandiego.gov/fire/services/cert  There you will find various links including a sign up for notifications when the next academy will be available.

CERT Continuing Education Announcment

Good afternoon, here's a special announcement about two Continuing Education classes that just listed. PLEASE READ THIS NOW, and decide whether or not you want to participate.  Note that sign-up for the first CE is embargoed until 20 November, so it is a "mark Your Calendar" item for now.

Collapse Survival Awareness— Saturday, 1 December 2012, 9:00am—Noon.  YOU CANNOT SIGN UP FOR THIS ONE UNTIL MIDNIGHT, 19 NOVEMBER.  The Beach Team is sponsoring it, so they have priority until then.  This is basically what it says it is, instruction on how to survive when the roof falls in on you.  That should never happen to CERT, but never is a very long time, and in a catastrophe we may find ourselves someplace where we are not supposed to be.  There is a lot of important information for this one:

·         FULL PPE IS REQUIRED (Personal protective equipment).  By that I mean helmet, gloves, dust mask, long sturdy pants, very solid footwear such as work or hiking boots, long sleeve shirt and jacket and gloves.  If ANY exposed skin is showing, you will not be able to participate.  A limited number of helmets and vests are available for those who don't have them yet.  If you want to sign up for this, and were planning to get your PPE but have not yet, sign up and drop me a note, I'll help you get fixed up.

·         You will be blindfolded for the exercise.  It's actually a bare substitute for the real thing, those of you who have experienced absolute blackness know what I'm talking about.

·         You will be required to crawl on your belly in a confined space.  No, I'm not joking.  That means elbow pads and knee pads are a REALLY good idea.  I personally don't think I'd do without them.

I'm going to say what you new people need to understand and our Veterans already know; not all of our drills are fun, or easy, or comfortable.  Those same drills are the ones that can save your life if/when the really bad news goes down.  If you have any issues with tight spaces, this is not your drill.  Back problems, knee problems, recent sprains etc., not your drill.

Sign up here:

https://apps.sandiego.gov/ereg/cert/courses.php?grp=Continuing+Education+Opportunities

Remember, no signup for us until 20 November.  Those of you married to Outlook or Exchange will want to create a reminder task.

Hose Loading—Sunday, 2 December 2012, 9:00am—2:00pm.  Yup, it's a long one, they really pack a lot into this drill.  Bring lots of water and something to snack on.  Basically you will be taught to  pack hose on a fire engine (or pumper).  You'll most likely be working with the Fire Academy's training engines.  As San Diego will (finally) be starting a new fire academy soon, I have no clue how this was pulled off, but let's take the gift for what it is.  There are three different kinds of hoses used by SDF&R, packed in six different bins on the engine, each packed a special way according to its use.  It's complicated.  You will learn how by doing, this is a totally hands on course.

Why are we doing this?  Basically, so we might be in a position to help if/when we have wildfires as we did in 2003 and 2007.  SDF&R is organized into three different shifts, or lists.  Schedules are organized so that each Firefighter has a certain number of days off in a row.  In a wildfire disaster situation, the City mobilizes its entire First Responder system to help with the effort.  Clearly there are not enough engines and trucks in the standing fleet for every Firefighter, and as Engines are needed most in this situation, the City maintains a Reserve fleet.  This Fleet is brought together, usually at Station 28, the large station just West of Montgomery Field that you can see from S-163.  The ready engines are fueled and provisioned, and they need to be packed with hose rather quickly.  This would normally take a large number of Firefighters who are of course not available, that's where we come in.  I have heard some talk that we might also be deployed to the field to pack hose while Firefighters go through required field rehab following direct contact with the fire.  That's just talk as far as I know.  We  don't really know how we will be used when the time comes, but as always, if we're needed, we'll want to be ready.

I took this CE last Summer and attended the next one to document it.  The course was extremely interesting, to me at least.  There is a lot of technology, technique and tradition involved.  I highly recommend it.

Sign up at the link above.  This course is open NOW for all registrants, if you want to do this get in now, seats won't last.

New Graduates, you are eligible for both CE's.  They are both on the same weekend, but nothing stops you from signing up for both if you are in good shape.  If you don't have gear yet, sign up, then get in touch with me.

-Steve

Mira Mesa CERT Newsletter Nov 13

Good morning, here is the news:

Bad Information—is almost impossible to get out of the system once it is in there, and bad info breeds more bad info.  Last week I announced that there would be no meeting in November, then in the same news item I covered December's meeting.  Bad formatting, those two things should have been separate items.  Then I put out a "Mark Your Calendar" announcement for January's meeting, but called it the December meeting instead.  From my subsequent correction email, some of you got the impression that there is no meeting in December.  Thus it goes.  So, please read the following meeting announcements carefully, I will try to get it all straight this time.

December Team Meeting— Our next meeting is on Monday, 10 December, 6:00pm—7:00pm.  We will meet in the Mira Mesa Senior Center, 8640 Mira Mesa Blvd.  That's between New Salem/Reagan Rd and Camino Ruiz.  The Senior Center is on the North Side of Mira Mesa Blvd., so you must be going westbound to get into the place.  Enter the first of two driveways, it is one way going in the first drive and one way coming out the second.  If you miss it, you should to go up Camino Ruiz, turn right on New Salem and make another pass.  Of course you could also try to get across four lanes of traffic on Mira Mesa Blvd., make the U-turn at Camino Ruiz, then the U-turn at Reagan/New Salem, just before 6:00pm on a weekday when it's dark out.  Your choice.  DO NOT park at the IHOP, your car will not be there when you return.

This meeting will be mainly an orientation for new members, so I especially hope our new people can make it.  We will go over what you need to do to qualify for DSW, and some good strategies for doing that.  We'll also cover basic PPE and other gear, you don't need to spend a fortune to be effective.  You Veterans please bring Go-bags if you want to share them, and any tips for getting hard to get gear like gloves that fit and such.  If we've got time (which I doubt) we'll take a look at the meeting calendar for 2013 and answer questions.

JANUARY Team Meeting—Please mark your calendars for Thursday, 10 January, 6:00pm.  We'll be meeting in the Senior Center.  Assistant Team Leader Jennifer Tang will be doing a wound care review.  If I know Jennifer, this will be very fast paced and informative.  We should have the Academy training kit, so it isn't necessary to bring your own supplies, however, if you'd like to try your own stuff out please do bring it along.  Basic wound care is one of those things we can't practice too much.  In a real situation, we'll need to be very competent and extremely efficient.  I hope you can make it.

Occasional Rant—the Rant is my little space for the occasional editorial.  Opinions are mine, and do not express the views of our CERT leadership or the City of San Diego.  This time I want to talk about situational awareness in light of my giving out bad data last week.  Information is like that, one minute it's a fact, the next it is wrong.  Having good information and regularly checking what you think you "know" is essential to maintaining your own safety and your group's safety as well as ensuring a successful mission.  Here are some essential items to remember:

·         Read carefully/listen well

·         Do not proceed if you are uncertain about what you just learned.  Ask for clarification.

·         Talk about what you are doing with your Team

·         Always ask "is it safe?"  Your safety is your personal responsibility

·         Always ask "it was safe the last time I asked, is it still safe?".  Things change.

Two of you caught my error last week before I printed a correction.  I'm sure some of you noticed it and wondered, then let it go.   That's fine for our current circumstances.  In an emergency I should have received a question from every single one of you who read it before my correction.  For you new folk, I think our Veterans will tell you that I don't make too many mistakes in the News, because as I said I know how hard it is to kill bad info, so I check my facts carefully.  Mistakes still happen.

That's all for this week, questions, comments you know how to find me.

-Steve

Mira Mesa CERT Newsletter Nov 6th

Good afternoon, here is the News:

NEW MEMBERS!—It is with great pleasure (bordering on joy) that I present our new graduates from Academy 28:

Andrew Bazeley

Landon Bazeley

Beth Harrison

Grifffin Harrison

Michael Jackson

Congratulations to you all!  This weekly email is intended to keep you up to speed on Team Meetings, upcoming CE's and other news important to our Team and San Diego CERT.  It typically comes out on Tuesday, sometimes Wednesday, sometimes Thursday if I have had a bad week.  I try to get everything in here, but if you have questions about anything, reply to this email, I'll do my best.  For you veterans, this email and the next several will have a lot of info you already know, for the benefit of our new people.

Team Meeting—NO MEETING FOR NOVEMBER.  Our next meeting is on Monday, 10 December, 6:00pm—7:00pm.  I prefer to start and end on time.  If the agenda might take us past 7, I'll try to give fair warning.  This meeting and most of our "indoor" meetings through 2013 is in the Mira Mesa Senior Center, 8640 Mira Mesa Blvd.  That's between New Salem/Reagan Rd and Camino Ruiz.  The Senior Center is on the North Side of Mira Mesa Blvd., so you must be going westbound to get into the place unless you have a commendable off-road vehicle and a total dis-regard for safe driving practices.  Enter the first of two driveways, it is one way going in the first drive and one way coming out the second.  The RSVP next door gets really cranky if you go in the second driveway.  If you miss the place, you'll have to go up Camino Ruiz, turn right on New Salem and make another pass.  DO NOT park at the IHOP, your car will not be there when you return.

This meeting will be mainly an orientation for new members, so I hope you all can make it.  We will go over what you need to do to qualify for DSW, and some good strategies for doing that.  We'll also cover basic PPE and other gear, you don't need to spend a fortune to be effective.  You Veterans please bring Go-bags if you want to share them, and any tips for getting hard to get gear like gloves that fit and such.

Next Meeting—Please mark your calendars for Thursday, 10 December.  We will once again be in the Senior Center, 6:00pm-7:00pm.  Our Assistant Team Leader Jennifer Tang will be reviewing emergency wound care.  Don't miss it.

Refresher Update this Weekend—You new people don't need a Refresher yet.  I'll explain "Refresher" in our orientation meeting, and in a subsequent news.  You folks who signed up for this, take note of the weather change.  A cold snap is predicted for this weekend, temperatures in the low 40's ,and there is a slight chance of rain.  Plan accordingly.

That's all for this weekend.  Questions, comments, you know how to find me.  NEW PEOPLE, please respond to this email, if I do not hear from you I will be contacting you directly.  It is important that you get the News every week.