Every April and October, hundreds of volunteers of the San Francisco Fire Department (SFFD) Neighborhood Emergency Response Team (NERT) assemble to practice their skills in a city-wide drill exercise. The exercise is a unique opportunity for these unpaid volunteers to establish a “staging area”, develop a response organizational structure, establish field teams to simulate search & rescue, triage, and other disaster response skills. The exercises are critical in honing the awareness and abilities of the NERT volunteers who will come together and assist the fire department, and the City and Country of San Francisco during a major disaster.
SFFD NERT Volunteers
The drills are sometimes distributed throughout the city in different locations to allow volunteers to work in varying settings. On Saturday April 12, 2014 however, all of the NERT volunteers will assemble at Everett Middle School to conduct the exercise together, alongside fire department, police department, Red Cross and City & County and many other professionals who support the effort.
How would you like to participate in this important exercise?
As part of the exercise, NERT volunteers are deployed in small Search & Rescue teams to practice the skills they may need in earnest when the next big earthquake or major disaster strikes San Francisco. A critical role for Search & Rescue teams is locating and medically triaging victims and you can help by volunteering to act as a victim for the exercise. Make up and props will help to sell the “injuries” you have, but a willingness to have some fun and act will help as the SFFD Firefighters will provide you with a scenario to provide to the Search & Rescue teams as they locate you.
Victims can be anyone, of any age (though anyone under 18 will need a parental consent to participate). You may be asked to pretend you are deaf, so you can’t follow spoken instructions from the S&R team. You may be asked to pretend you are in shock and you may go in and out of consciousness while the S&R team tries to assist you. You may be totally fine physically, but a little loopy from the stress of the disaster and simply shouting incoherently at everyone. Victims are literally asked to perform a whole host of roles to challenge and prepare the volunteer Search & Rescue teams for what they may encounter in the aftermath of a real disaster. You are a volunteer yourself also though, so you won’t be asked to do anything you feel uncomfortable with.
SFFD NERT Search & Rescue team asses a “victim”
Volunteering as a victim for the exercise gives you a front row seat to one important aspect of the disaster response resources that will be brought to bear in the City and County of San Francisco when THE BIG one hits. Who knows, it may even inspire you to take the FREE NERT training provided by the fire department so you can participate as a NERT in the next exercise.
Everett Middle School, Enter schoolyard on 17th Street b/tw Church and Sanchez Sts
50 Triage Volunteers (Non-NERTs) Needed—Waiver required, see link below*
8:30 AM — Check-in at the ‘Victim’ table. Bring signed waiver.
Lunch provided. RSVP for drill and lunch by April 4th at: http://bit.ly/1gTfwWv
*Waiver Link: http://bit.ly/1fwIGHq
To learn more about NERT, go to http://www.sf-fire.org/index.
Lunch provided.
