STORMY WEATHER... Compliments Of El Niño
Public Safety Preparation and Response
By Nancy J. Rigg
| Nancy J. Rigg is a writer, filmmaker and consultant with an extensive background in Search and Rescue, public safety education, and disaster preparedness. She is a frequent contributor to 9-1-1 Magazine. |
| Sidebar: Death in the Cuyama Swiftwater Rescue |
| Web Site of Note: World Lifesaving Association |
| Photographs: (select thumbnail to view detail image) |
 Homes on a bluff north of Bodega Bay, California, are in danger or sliding into the ocean due to El Niño-enhanced wave action and saturated soil. R.C. Hall |
 Rescue teams from the Monte Rio and Bodega Bay Fire Departments set out in Zodiak boats in the flooded Russian River in Northern California during the 1998 floods. They participated as rescue units as well as removing hazardous floating debris from the river, such as loose propane tanks and the like. R.C. Hall |
 Preparing for El Niño: a joint swiftwater rescue exercise keeps members of Los Angeles County, Glendale, and other southern California Fire Departments ready for the inevitable. Sean Fairburn |
 Search team members from the Charlotte Fire Department follow a Search & Resue K9 looking for victims in the creek. The department found this raft type inflatable boat best-suited for this work. Charlotte Fire Dept. |
 Members of the Los Angeles Fire Department join other swiftwater rescue teams during deployments to Northern California in 1997. Jack Wise/LAFD |
 Heavy rains and overflowing rivers resulted in flooding like this in Northern California during1997. Swiftwater Rescue Teams from the state's USAR task Forces were mobilized to assist in rescuing people trapped by the floodwaters. Jack Wise/LAFD |
This article can be found on
page 32 of the Mar/Apr 1998
issue of 9-1-1 Magazine.
Mother Nature's bad boy, El Niño, is one of those scientific attention-grabbers that has everybody talking. And joking. And worrying. And preparing. As early as June, 1997, meteorologists took center stage with compelling graphics of the Pacific Ocean. The El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is here, they said, pointing to an ominous, growing blob of red. It's big. We're going to get hit hard.
"This El Niño's a wonderful thing, if you're interested in making predictions," said Ed O'Lenic, Director of the National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center. "It was one of the earliest on record, and is going to end up being rated as more powerful than the 1982-83 El Niño."
To help provide government agencies with accurate information, the National Weather Service has developed a sophisticated web site, including an experimental product called a "Weekly Threats Assessment" page, which offers a detailed look at potential problems. "It's intended for people like emergency managers," O'Lenic explained, "to be able to see what's going to be important next week." Because access to this site requires a password, O'Lenic recommends that interested emergency personnel contact the National Weather Service to sign on.
"Water is a very powerful, but under-rated natural hazard," O'Lenic said. He downplayed the El Niño media hype, preferring to focus on the positive aspects of ENSO predictions, which is providing useful information "way ahead of time, giving everybody, from emergency planners to the guy who needs to fix his roof, a chance to prepare."
Storm Watch: California
Disaster managers throughout California took the El Niño prediction seriously, and intensified their efforts of many years to strengthen flood disaster preparedness and response capability statewide. "What distinguishes El Niño storms from the usual California storm pattern is the severity and the potential for extensive damage and life-loss," explained Assistant Chief Michael Antonucci, of the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services (OES) Fire and Rescue Branch. "El Niño storms have the potential to create 500-year floods, which can overwhelm even the best delivery systems."
To offset the tragic fact that flooding is the leading cause of weather-related death in the United States, OES launched a pioneering program to add swiftwater rescue teams to eight state-supported Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) Task Forces in 1995. OES USAR Task Force Swiftwater Rescue Teams were first deployed during the Northern California floods of 1997, and have been mobilized numerous times since then. The new OES Swiftwater Rescue Advisory Committee, with representatives from fire and law enforcement agencies, is developing a comprehensive database of all swiftwater rescue resources statewide, and setting standards for training and equipment.
"Identifying and typing resources is something that has long been needed," said Capt. Jack Wise, who serves as Swiftwater Rescue Program Coordinator for the Los Angeles City Fire Department, and co-chairman of the OES Swiftwater Rescue Committee. Because severe floods can have widespread impact, overwhelming local resources, Capt. Wise explained that swiftwater rescue teams from throughout the state can now be quickly mobilized and moved into areas needing extra resources. "With the teams now typed," he added, "if I ask for an extra Type-I Swiftwater Rescue Team to help us here in Los Angeles, I know exactly what I'm getting, as far as the number of people, the level of training, and what equipment and capabilities they have."
"We're kind of the pioneers as far as setting new standards and managing swiftwater rescue resources," OES Chief Antonucci said. Although the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has not yet adopted the water rescue portion of USAR, primarily due to funding, "they've called us up during some major flooding events," Antonucci said. "With all of the floods that we've had in recent years in the Central and Eastern parts of the United States, there's a lot of interest now in response."
Rescuer safety has been an area of on-going concern, according to Capt. Jack Wise. "The high number of rescuer deaths in swift water is atrocious," he said bluntly. "We lost one firefighter recently in Tennessee, and almost lost two here in California: one during swiftwater rescue training, and another who got pulled into the wash with a victim. We're on the right track overall, but I won't be happy until nobody dies in a flood."
Storm Watch: North Carolina
For Capt. Timothy Rogers of the Charlotte Fire Department, "El Niño has made everybody here more in tune with the need for swiftwater rescue and flood preparedness." Vast areas of Texas, Florida, and the Southeast have been inundated for weeks at a time since December by El Niño-enhanced storms. "We're in a continuing state of emergency right now," Capt. Rogers added, "and it still isn't over."
Floods hit Charlotte hard and early. In July of 1997, an unusual "feeder band" from a Gulf hurricane dumped record amounts of precipitation on the city in a short period of time. "It's been interesting to experience the kind of intense flooding they get out west," Rogers said wryly.
"We got 8-inches of rain in four-hours," said Battalion Chief Jeff Dulin, who coordinates the Charlotte Fire Department's swiftwater rescue program. "We had massive flooding all over the city. We had to evacuate over 3,000 people, do about 100 basic rescues where we moved people across water that they couldn't manage alone, and we made 20-30 contact rescues where people were in peril in fast-moving water." With everyone in the department trained to the first responder level, and more than 300 swiftwater rescue technicians (SRT-I, SRT-II) scattered throughout the city, Dulin was satisfied that the department was well-prepared overall to handle the event, although there were lessons learned.
With a night staff of only three telecommunications specialists, when the storm struck, the communications center was quickly overwhelmed. Communications Training Officer Marsha Matheney said that while the department had worked on a flood response plan, the communications aspect had never been implemented. "We handled 1,375 calls during that storm," Matheney recounted, "not just our usual 2-300 for the same time period. Ordinarily we handle a call all the way through, including 9-1-1 and radio communications. We do it all. But in this situation, with a lot of swiftwater rescues, evacuations, and traffic wrecks, we were under siege."
Telecommunicator Kathy Lacy recalled one particularly harrowing incident. "I received a 911 call from a gentleman who was in his car, which was stalled in quickly rising water," she said. Because the man, who was "very excited and upset", was calling from a cellular phone, it was difficult to pinpoint his exact location. Lacy calmed him, ferreted enough information out of him to direct a fire truck into the area, and stayed on the line with him until he was located and rescued.
As a result of the deluge, the communications center now has a written plan in place for emergencies. "There are so many things in communications that even if you have a written plan, you still have to wing it a little," Marsha Matheney said. "But from now on, during an emergency, we'll split up into call-takers and radio dispatchers to allow us to better handle the sheer volume."
North Carolina is following California's example of establishing a statewide swiftwater rescue response system. During the steady stream of storms which have plagued the state this winter, swiftwater rescue teams have been deployed several times to areas lacking swiftwater rescue resources or needing additional support. According to Chief Dulin, one hard-hit area was Avery County. "Like flash floods in the west, the water was so violent and had such force that it destroyed everything," Dulin recounted. "Wooden houses were nothing but splinters, mobile home trailers were wrapped around trees, cars were demolished and buried in the mud. It reminded me more of a debris flow than just a flash flood."
Although the local volunteer fire department lacked swiftwater rescue training, they recognized the potential danger early enough to warn residents to evacuate, saving many lives. "This was the first time that this community had ever had a disaster of this magnitude," Chief Dulin added. "We helped them set up a command post, coordinate with the Red Cross and the National Guard, and organize a search."
On a sad note, Dulin indicated that it was during this series of storms when "a rescuer was killed in a swiftwater incident just across the border, in Tennessee." With an edge of frustration coloring his voice, Dulin said, "Too many people think that it will never happen where they are. But any community that has creeks or rivers has a potential for devastating floods, not just California or Arizona. You need to be ready for this, whether you're used to getting floods or not."
For the Charlotte Fire Department, "the protection of rescue personnel was the biggest selling point in developing our program," Dulin said. "We've made a commitment to our personnel to provide them with the right training and equipment for them to work in this environment as safely as they can. We may not be able to save every civilian out there, but we're no good to anybody if we can't protect ourselves first."
Capt. Rogers added that in addition to fire-rescue personnel, every government agency with potential involvement in a flood disaster needs flood safety training. "Flooding is not a singular event like a house fire or a bank robbery," he said. "When a flood happens, everybody's there. If you're in public service, you're there. And everybody needs to know what they're doing so we can avoid adding extra victims who are would-be rescuers. The guy out there riding around in a utility truck needs to be safe, to know what to do if he sees someone get swept away, and to be able to report to us what's going on."
"If you don't have a plan," Dulin said, "you're going to spend the whole time playing catch-up in a flood. And you may lose not only your own people, but the lives of citizens who are depending on you to be there for them."
Storm Watch: Texas
"There's been a lot of hype about El Niño here in Texas," Casey Ping of Austin EMS said. "We had a big countywide meeting a while back to do some special planning and make sure we had all the proper equipment ready to go. Other than some relatively minor flooding incidents, we haven't been that hard hit. But we still have the spring to get through."
Austin EMS covers the City of Austin, providing both ground ambulance and helicopter transport services. The helicopter team also serves 1100 square miles of rural Travis County. In addition to the ambulance service, Austin EMS supports a special operations team, "which is pretty unique," Ping said. "Not many EMS departments have people who specialize in rescue." 170 field personnel serve as first responders during floods, and twenty-five rescue-paramedics are trained in swiftwater rescue, including helicopter operations.
Lack of swiftwater rescue standards has been an on-going problem, Ping said, noting that Austin has recently established its own "system-wide standards" for swiftwater rescue. "If you have one fire department offering a four-hour course and calling themselves swiftwater trained," Ping explained, "and another department requiring a forty-hour class, the result is a potentially-dangerous mix of skill levels. It's critical to have everybody working from the same plan, and sharing a common level of training."
Ping emphasized that communications is an integral part of Austin's flood response plan. "Our communications people are our first step in making sure that the right resources get on scene for water rescues," he said. "We've pinpointed our trouble spots, identified rescue sites, and worked out our pre-planning. Our dispatch matrix helps determine whether or not the helicopter should be dispatched."
Lessons Learned: Future Plans
"You think you know everything until a major flood hits your area," Capt. Rob Brisley, Public Information Officer for the Charlotte Fire Department, said. "We've learned a lot from past experience, and we've come a long way, but in addition to getting personnel trained in swiftwater rescue, more needs to be done to educate the public about the unique dangers posed by flooding. The fire service needs to move beyond `stop, drop, roll,' and to add water safety to school and community outreach programs nationwide."
Capt. Timothy Rogers agrees. "We're planning to be real aggressive in developing public service announcements," he said, adding that team members are also polishing their television and radio interview skills, so that they can take advantage of on-scene news interviews to remind the public "not to drive through swollen creeks and streams or flooded roads, and not to let children play near the water."
Citing an overall lack of educational tools, Rogers noted that the flood safety education video, "NO WAY OUT," produced by the Los Angeles County Office of Education and the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works, is one product which he uses "in every class I teach, because it's so touching and to the point." After hitting his classes with hard facts and figures, Rogers said, "We need to bring back the human side of this problem. This isn't about El Niño. This is about you, folks. This is about loss and tragedy. Property, we can rebuild. Cars, we can replace. But life is irreplaceable. Losing someone's life in a flood is preventable."
