Planning Section Chief

[Dustoff]

Furthermore I feel that FEMA should be disbanded and that its responsibilities should be assumed by DoD. - ESPECIALLY AFTER KATRINA
the Dod (especially the USCG) was on the ball. FEMA however really screwed the pooch.
Short of DoD assuming FEMAs role, we should go back to the old 'Civil Defense' Service.

The scuttlebut from Greensburg is that the residents are singing the praises of FEMA.  Maybe they learned some lessons?!?

Cruised through there the other day.  Gonna be a big mess for a v-e-r-y long time.

Jim

[arajca]

Furthermore I feel that FEMA should be disbanded and that its responsibilities should be assumed by DoD. - ESPECIALLY AFTER KATRINA
the Dod (especially the USCG) was on the ball. FEMA however really screwed the pooch.
Short of DoD assuming FEMAs role, we should go back to the old 'Civil Defense' Service.

DoD has no interest - or authority - to run long-term recovery operations. FEMA operations do not end after a few weeks. The recovery end can easily last years - and usually does. The only DoD function that has anything similar is the ACE, but even their mandate is very limited and generally does not include direct assistance to disaster victims.

I suggest reviewing the history of FEMA. FEMA History.

Before FEMA every disaster was handled differently and required a Congressional action to get relief or help to the victims.

Then you have something called a MERT - Medical Emergency Response Team. -- This is basically a bastardized ER / MASH unit.
I say, forget that, lets get a few more National Guard MASH units
OR ( even better)  Lets get our own CAP MASH units back.
(they WERE around a few decades ago)

Interesting idea. Do you have any kind of a plan for this idea? The laws have changed significantly since the last CAP MASH units closed.

[floridacyclist]

Then you have something called a MERT - Medical Emergency Response Team. -- This is basically a bastardized ER / MASH unit.
I say, forget that, lets get a few more National Guard MASH units
OR ( even better)  Lets get our own CAP MASH units back.
(they WERE around a few decades ago)

Is that anything like a DMAT? All the information I found on MERTs referred to small teams trained to handle medical emergencies in companies and factories until the FFs could get there. We used to have something similar at our office complex because the nearest red truck was 10 minutes away.

[ZigZag911]

From my sources I understand that FEMA was pretty good at what it did when it was a 'stand alone agency',  till it was swallowed by HLS Dept and got drowned in the bureaucracy & political infighting.

[SarDragon]

FEMA has sucked for a long time. They were really horrible during Hurricane Hugo and  the SF 'quake in '89, and promised they would use lessons learned to improve. Then there was Hurricane Andrew in '92, and they still sucked, but, according to some, not as much. More here. It's not a perfect article, but gives useable info.

[JohnKachenmeister]

Part of FEMA's problem in Katrina was that nobody took charge.  The LA state governor never even called out the NG for political reasons (She is a Democrat, and wanted to try to link the lack of an NG response to troop levels in the War on Terror, she told the media that President Bush did not give her "Permission" to mobilize her NG forces).  The mayor of NO was (and still is) an incompetent boob, and the state and local police forces are the poster children for corruption.

FEMA's Brown, being a lawyer, recognized that FEMA's mission is to asist local and state agencies, and insisted on waiting for requests per policy and guidance.  Since the state and local agencies were paralyzed, FEMA failed to go into action until it was too late.

What was needed, in my opinion was an "Al Haig Moment," referring to the time when Reagan was shot, with the Vice President out of Washington, and Haig being Secretary of State annoucing that he was "In charge."  Actually, he wasn't, both the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House were in Washington and were ahead of him in the line of presidential succession, but that made no difference. 

Nobody stepped up to take charge until DoD took over the effort. 

[RiverAux]

The LA state governor never even called out the NG for political reasons (She is a Democrat, and wanted to try to link the lack of an NG response to troop levels in the War on Terror, she told the media that President Bush did not give her "Permission" to mobilize her NG forces). 

Kach, this is factually incorrect.  Please see this timeline of LA NG activities in regards to Katrina http://hsgac.senate.gov/_files/Katrina/020906_Landreneau_Timeline.pdf.  There were significant deployments of the LA NG before the hurricane even hit. 

The LA Gov did slam the President  for having 3000 of the LA NG overseas where they could do no good for the state, but the rest of the Guard was active.

[floridacyclist]

I also recall Nagin coming up on the news Monday afternoon and telling everyone that "We're OK, we dodged the bullet". I'm sure at that point that many forces began standing down.

3 days later, I was on the ground in New Orleans and there were lots of federal and FEMA folks at the airport, which was crawling with DMATs (was how I got involved with them), and more pouring in.

I won't say that FEMA performed flawlessly and I think Michael Brown should have been put in jail for fraudulently endangering the public (if he was in China, he would have been executed), but I do not see where they did nearly as badly as the media made them out to be considering the vast scope of the disaster. They have always told folks to be ready to be on their own for 3 days; we were there at K+3 and FEMA was rolling into town in force in the areas they could drive in.

After that experience, I do not trust the news media...the first story I saw on CNN when I got out was how  we were eacuating Tulane hospital by helicopter because they were a rich white hospital and ignoring the poor mostly-black Charity hospital while neglecting to mention that we had volunteered to stay over and continue the evac of Charity since their LZ was flooded. They turned us down because they thought it was too dangerous flying choppers between the skyscrapers.

[JohnKachenmeister]

I stand corrected.  There was a callout of the Guard before the storm hit.

[SARMedTech]

Then you have something called a MERT - Medical Emergency Response Team. -- This is basically a bastardized ER / MASH unit.
I say, forget that, lets get a few more National Guard MASH units
OR ( even better)  Lets get our own CAP MASH units back.
(they WERE around a few decades ago)

Is that anything like a DMAT? All the information I found on MERTs referred to small teams trained to handle medical emergencies in companies and factories until the FFs could get there. We used to have something similar at our office complex because the nearest red truck was 10 minutes away.

To both of the posters quoted here:

I think you need to do some more research into MERT teams. I am a BLS Specialist on a MERT team and some of your information is not quite right: Here's why:

1. They are not bastardized anythings. These are teams of highly trained professionals doing what can be very difficult work and they also provide the medical specialists for the USAR Task Forces that operated in 28 states.

2. MERT teams do not respond to situations in factories and the like until the FF can get there. Im not sure where you got that information, but it really doesnt match up with the facts. About the only way a MERT would show up at a factory is if it caught fire and took days to contain and constant onsite medical teams were needed.

3. MERT teams not only work very closely with the NG, they also provide medical standby and emergency care for NG units during training and emergency domestic deployments.

4. There is nothing MASH like about a MERT since MASH units are surgical hospitals.

5. As opposed to "CAP MASH" units, MERT teams are made up of MDs, EMTs, Medics, Nurses, CNAs, and even dentists and veterinarians.

6. They are well trained and highly regarded enough to have responsed along with USAR Task Forces to the WTC, Katrina and Rita. The Illinois MERT (IMERT) is also the medical provider on standby in Chicago each year when a few million visitors converge on the city for a outdoor festival called Taste of Chicago as well as responding to the windy city during the heat emergencies of the summer of 2006.

Im honored to be a part of such a great program and am amazed and the great work they do. You might want to do some fact checking before you go slinging insults. The closest MERTs get to resembling military medical units is that they are uniformed (in BBDUs and boonies) and wear combat boots. There ends the similarity.

[JohnKachenmeister]

SARMed:

I'm rushing to the defense of my fellow Floridian, Gene.

Gene did NOT toss out any insult, and from his post, it appears that he did try some fact-checking.

I have never heard of "MERT" and the facts that Gene could find indicated that they were industrial-based first-responders, somewhat akin to local "Fire Brigades" that respond to emergencies in fire-prone industries such as chemical plants.

If there is something else out there, educate us.  Don't get mad because MERT is America's second-best kept secret after CAP.

[floridacyclist]

Some of the pages I was looking at....

http://www.lessstress.com/mert.htm
http://www.lifesafety.com/mert
http://www.med.umich.edu/em/clinops/mert.htm
http://www.ucar.edu/communications/staffnotes/0105/mert.html
http://www.roughnotes.com/rnmagazine/2006/may06/05p068.htm

My unit's homepage
http://www.floridaonedmat.com

You know, that's the 4th  time I've seen a variant of the B-word used in this thread LOL

[SARMedTech]

SARMed:

I'm rushing to the defense of my fellow Floridian, Gene.

Gene did NOT toss out any insult, and from his post, it appears that he did try some fact-checking.

I have never heard of "MERT" and the facts that Gene could find indicated that they were industrial-based first-responders, somewhat akin to local "Fire Brigades" that respond to emergencies in fire-prone industries such as chemical plants.

If there is something else out there, educate us.  Don't get mad because MERT is America's second-best kept secret after CAP.

First off, I apologize for my over-reaction. MERT teams like the one with which I am associated (IMERT-Illinois Medical Emergency Response Team) are associated with several agencies including FEMA, the Red Cross, DHS, USPHS and also provide the medical specialists (doctors, dentists, EMTs, etc) for the USAR Task Forces (Like IL-TF-1) which fall under the auspices of FEMA and DHS.

There are other types of MERT teams, but to my knowledge there PRIMARY job is not to handle a situation until FD or EMS gets there, but rather to be deployed by local, state and federal agencies to assist during disasters, both man made and natural. The IMERT team has responded in recent years to an ice storm in Macon County, Illinois in which they provided medical services for people who were on life support or had just been released from the hospital and no one to tend to their medical needs. They also responded to Katrina, Rita, Ivan and the recent tornadoes in Kansas and other Plains states.

That being said,yes, there are industrial MERT teams, teams that only handle mass casualty industrial accidents, teams that handle only MCIs in terms of train derailments and its also now the fad to find MERT teams at colleges and universities staffed by students and staff who are trained and licensed to the FR or EMT level.

What I objected to most was the "bastardized MASH" comment. That makes it sound as if MERT teams are slap-dash and haphazard in their organization and that the responders that staff them are somehow second rate, which is simply not the case. IMERT has surgeons, dentists, nurses, paramedics, EMTs and allied health professionals. They are funded and supplied by state and federal grants and are often transported to disaster sites by ANG C-130s and USAF transport and cargo aircraft. State MERT teams enjoy a close connection with the NG and ANG and here in Illinois often work side by side with service men and women from those organizations. So to call the a bastardized anything is really demonstrative of a lack of knowledge about what they do, their skill level and their dedication to what they do. Another interesting aspect is that though I am an Illinois licensed EMT, if I am deployed to other states, I can still function within the scope of my license, so long as it is current and I am in good standing. This sort of makes me think of the whole idea of CAP EMS (not really CAP MASH since MASH by definition is a surgical hospital which I believe has been replaced by the CSH or combat support hospital system...the last MASH unit, the 4077th, was disbanded more than a decade ago). If independent MERT units can get this kind of MOU that they can operate across state lines regardless of where the team members are licensed, it certainly seems that CAP ought to be able to accomplish something roughly similar to this concept. Just a thought.  I shall now don my flame suit.

[floridacyclist]

OK, but I was still asking about how that is like or different from a DMAT?

[SARMedTech]

OK, but I was still asking about how that is like or different from a DMAT?

Capt-

Im only familiar with DMATs in passing, but my understanding is that MERT teams and DMATs are largely similar, though they may operate under the auspices of different agencies (ie DHS, FEMA, etc). Also as has been said, MERTs can be run by state EMAs, regional emergency systems or federal ones and as my new research tells me, the MERT is not always about disasters, though that is where they come into their own as well trained medical "strike forces." It was correct that MERT training is available to non-medical personnel also to respond to medical emergencies in schools, universities, etc. Then there are CERT teams, which tend to be community based and ERT teams which can be medical but can also have a techinical rescue and extrication team, fire fighting abilities, etc. The MERT I am with is state run and only does medical as its is associated with IL-TF-1 which is a USAR team and they provide the extrication, SAR, etc. I hope that answers your question. In the wake of 9-11, there are alot of similar teams like these cropping up to provide training and rapid response to large scale disasters and terrorist events. The Illinois MERT team responds to many natural disaster events but also spends alot of time training for post-terror attack medical response. For example in September there will be a course for IMERT members focusing on immediate response to NBC type attacks. The IMERT team is also set up so that the first team can be deployed within 4 hours maximum of being dispatched. They train quite heavily for rapid response and deployment scenarios. Long story short, it seems to me that DMAT and state MERT teams are quite similar.

[Dustoff]

Web link

http://www.imert.org/

Jim

[floridacyclist]

Cool. We function as a MERT too then, only we call it the SMRT..State Medical Response Team. Kind of like CAP or the Nat'l Guard, we can serve under federal or state auspices according to who mobilizes us.

[SAR-EMT1]

MERT and DMAT are identical but for the agency in cahrge.

I am fairly up to date with  DMATs and MERTS (and IMERT in particular)
- as for ToC and Lolopalooza in Grant Park... BTDT

I apologize if I enflamed anyone with my use of the term 'bastardized MASH'

I know IMERT isnt a MASH - I was refering more to the mobile medical facility aspect.
But I never mentioned that calling a MERT/DMAT a MASH unit is a slap in the face.
Most MASH units had fine personnel and werent slap and dash outfits with second rate personnel.

Maybe instead of bastardized I should have said civilianized.

[SARMedTech]

MERT and DMAT are identical but for the agency in cahrge.

I am fairly up to date with  DMATs and MERTS (and IMERT in particular)
- as for ToC and Lolopalooza in Grant Park... BTDT

I apologize if I enflamed anyone with my use of the term 'bastardized MASH'

I know IMERT isnt a MASH - I was refering more to the mobile medical facility aspect.
But I never mentioned that calling a MERT/DMAT a MASH unit is a slap in the face.
Most MASH units had fine personnel and werent slap and dash outfits with second rate personnel.

Maybe instead of bastardized I should have said civilianized.

Again, I am sorry for my enflamed reaction. Youre right that it was the word "bastardized" which to me has the connotation of being sort of watered-down and not as good. I think "civilianized" is a better word, though Ive found IMERT so far to be loosely based on the military model, but then most of EMS is. In fact, IMERT uses the terms "Commander" and "Lieutenant" for certain higher ups on each team, generally physicians. The rest of us are merely "Specialists." SAREMT, are you on IMERT?

[JohnKachenmeister]

Incidentally, I think the Army had MASH units until something like 2006.  A Mobile Army Surgical Hospital was intended to provide surgical care at a level between the Battalion Aid Station and a Field Hospital.  They were not intended to provide nursing care beyond postoperative care, as the patient would be evacuated farther to the rear real fast.

They were usually located in the Brigade rear, but could also be found in the Division Support Area.