Tuesday, January 31, 2006
Let us pray...
Good Morning.
This is just a very quick response to an article that appeared in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette last Thursday featuring our own Richard Matason, Director of the Westmoreland County Department of Emergency Management.
First of all, if you did not see the article, here is a reprint for you… catch up time.
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Training exercise to test readiness of emergency responders
'Crisis' to strike county on schedule in October
Thursday, January 26, 2006
By Rebekah Scott, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Operation Urban Thunder" will roll across Westmoreland in October with a simultaneous countywide weather nightmare and a weapon of mass destruction in Greensburg. The county court house and city hall will evacuate, and Westmoreland's 4,000-plus emergency responders will scramble to secure the devastated county seat.
It's only a test.
It's the latest in Westmoreland County public safety department's full-scale training exercises, "the biggest one yet attempted," according to safety director Rich Matason.
Urban Thunder will continue for 24 hours, testing the responses of the county's emergency operations center and public safety department, as well as any of the county's 118 fire departments, 38 emergency medical providers, and 40-plus police departments who choose to take part.
The faux crisis will strike on a Friday and force city and county officials to enact their emergency backup plans.
The "continuity of government" aspect is especially pertinent in light of post-Katrina government breakdowns seen along the Gulf Coast in 2005, Mr. Matason said.
Westmoreland has a history of apocalyptic scenarios. They started in 2001 with "Mall Strike," during which more than 500 emergency responders and volunteers responded to a "dirty bomb" and chemical explosion at the former Greengate Mall.
In 2003, "Crimson Lion" enacted a hydrogen-cyanide agent released at a basketball game at Penn State-New Kensington.
Monessen was the next target. "Kopper River" acted out a corporate response to a weapon of mass destruction at a chemical plant there in 2004.
Last July the horror show moved to West Newton, where "terrorists" took hostages on a railroad car and released a chemical agent. Mr. Matason called it "Operation Twisted Rail."
"I get to name them," he said, grinning like a boy. "It's my background, 29 years in the Army National Guard. ... We love these dramatic titles for our operations. This all is a tremendously fun thing for me, but it's also a tremendous amount of work."
Others help decide whether this year's weather disaster will be a blizzard, tornado or flood -- "in October the weather is a wide-open field around here," he said. The type of weapon of mass destruction also will be a committee decision.
"We'll involve as many jurisdictions as possible," he said.
It's a long time in the works: the planning, the classes, "tabletop" exercises and the exercise itself.
After that, the county officials must write a full "after-action report" and submit it to the Department of Homeland Security for critique.
"That establishes our training plans for the next two years," Mr. Matason said. "We address our weak points that way."
But make-believe trauma is only a part of the 2006 plan, he said. The county's much-touted 800-megahertz emergency radio system still needs improving, and the department is applying for grants to buy repeater units to better serve weak areas.
A new mobile repeater unit housed in a van will allow dispatchers to set up shop at emergency sites and "virtually eliminate any communication interoperability issues" the terrain might present.
It's not all drama, gadgets and gee-whiz vehicles, though: Mr. Matason said 10 trainees started learning the ropes in November at the county's 911 dispatch center. By spring the center will be staffed fully.
Westmoreland County budgeted $47 million for public safety in 2006, 18 percent of its $317 million spending plan.
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The Blah-ger responds with the following.
Mr. Matason, if it is going to take you several months to prepare for a disaster then WE HAVE PROBLEMS.
A JET Inbound to Latrobe’s Arnold Palmer Regional Airport CRASHING somewhere in Latrobe, an EXPLOSION at an Oil Company in Kecksburg, a HEAD ON CRASH of two trains in Greensburg with both trains filled with TOXIC CHEMICALS are DISASTERS THAT YOU DO NOT PLAN A DATE FOR, THEY JUST HAPPEN AND THEY ARE UNANNOUNCED !
YOU CANNOT HAVE A TRUE IDEA OF HOW WELL THE COUNTY IS GOING TO DO BY TELLING EVERYONE WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN, FINDING OUT WHO IS GOING TO PARTICIPATE IN THE DRILL, PLAN AND ANNOUNCE THE DATE AND TIME OF WHEN YOUR DISASTER IS GOING TO TAKE PLACE, AND THEN PUBLISH THE DETAILS OF YOUR LITTLE DISASTER DRILL IN THE PAPER AND TO ALL FIRST RESPONDERS !
If you are then focusing your training for the next two years on the weak points of your faults after one of your PLANNED drills, at the end of those two years most of your training will be OUT DATED.
A planned drill will NOT show your TRUE weak spots !
I ALSO DARE YOU TO HAVE YOUR DRILL IN THE LIGONIER VALLEY AREA, WHERE YOU SAY THERE ISN'T ANY RADIO DEAD SPOTS.
If you want to see how ready we really are, have the 911 center set off everyone’s sirens WITHOUT NOTICE and have the county's First Responders respond to an UNANNOUNCED drill of undisclosed nature and see who shows up, see what equipment is in or out of service, see if this Radio Cyst-Em you put together works, see who follows procedures and who doesn’t – THEN WRITE YOUR “AFTER-ACTION-REPORT”.
Anyone can take a weekend off and be at their stations waiting on a drill to begin !
And you are planning on doing what ? Evacuating an EMPTY court house ?
AND ANOTHER THING !
YOU CANNOT SPEND OUR MONEY ON ANOTHER COMMUNICATIONS VAN, even though this one is different than the last.
This new VAN will act like a “REPEATER UNIT” whereas the other one acts like what, a BIG BLACK PIMPLE REPRESENTING A MILLION DOLLARS WE FLUSHED DOWN THE TURLET ?
the Big Black Million Dollar Plus Pimple waiting to dive into the outdoor porta-potty at Laurel Valley Golf Club. Look at the head on that !If you want a Repeater Unit, spend Five Dollars and put a BULL HORN on the BLACK PIMPLE !
In all seriousness, we do not need that VAN but if you are so set on buying a repeater vehicle, just ADD the needed equipment to the CHARTER BUS we already have. Amateur Radio operators could probably do this for about a few hundred dollars whereas you are going to plan how much ? Another Few Million Dollars !
You could also feed beans to Dan's truck... that would make it a repeater.
You have admitted again that we have poor communications in parts of Westmoreland County, thank you ! We know that, now FIX IT. If I know how to repair our system you should also, so start repairing ! EVEN PEMA DISAGREES WITH HOW YOU HAVE PUT THIS SYSTEM TOGETHER !!
This system should NEVER have be put on line if ALL AREAS OF WESTMORELAND COUNTY DID NOT HAVE FULL COVERAGE, you should have left it in the TEST MODE until everything was fixed. But you wouldn't want this system sitting around in the TEST mode for 40 years, would you ?
Mr. Matason, IMO you live in your own little world where you just like to spend OUR money to benefit YOUR life.
I NEED TO REPEAT ONE PARAGRAPH IN THAT ARTICLE, JUST IN CASE SOMEONE HAPPENED TO MISS IT.
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"I get to name them," he said, grinning like a boy. "It's my background, 29 years in the Army National Guard. ... We love these dramatic titles for our operations. This all is a tremendously fun thing for me, but it's also a tremendous amount of work."
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No wonder you GRIN LIKE A LITTLE BOY, you get to drive a FREE VEHICLE, EAT FOR FREE, FREE GAS, FREE TRIPS, FREE CELL PHONE SERVICE and YOU GET TO NAME OPERATIONS. WOW !
29 YEARS IN THE NATIONAL GUARD TAUGHT YOU HOW TO NAME THINGS AND TAKE OUR MONEY ? I HOPE YOU LEARNED MORE THAN THAT !
I will give you credit for one thing, and that is your service to our country. BUT, what you are doing now sir is a DISSERVICE to your COUNTY !
Through-out my BLAH-GS I have pointed out all the PERKS you have, EACH ONE taking away from our communities. Don’t you get PAID ENOUGH that you can drive your own car and pay for your own gas, pay your own insurance, buy your own food, pay for your own cellular phone service, and so on and so on… sounds to me like you are on WELFARE !
I WILL PRAY FOR YOU.
DECODED,
K3SAM
http://800.k3sam.com – website
news@k3sam.com – email address for those that care
(Thanks to GMan for sending me the article.)
NOTICE TO ALL JURISDICTIONS: If you are not in a community that will be named in any of Richard Matason’s Fun and Grin Drills then you do not have to worry about being in any disasters. Mr. Matason said that he will “involve as many jurisdictions as possible”, so if you are not in one of those jurisdictions then you should not worry as only those jurisdictions he names will ever have problems.
