By Gene Maloney

On January 19th 1994 the San Fernando earth quake happened. There are many hospitals in the valley which were closed either because of being over loaded with patients or damage to the hospital. Because of the size of the incident, the fire department was handicapped because they also needed to fight fires, perform rescues and treat the injured. They were also limited in the amount of back up medical supplies that were available. I am proud to say that they did take action by implementing a plan where they would have equipment and supplies prepositioned throughout their community. The plan is to place specially designed Mass Casualty Trailers in various locations throughout the region. These trailers will establish their triage and treatment sites. In addition, they also will place specially designed Casualty Collection Point trailers in specific locations. This plan will allow them to address the surge of patients in an MCI or CCP . As in the case of the 1994 quake, if more supplies were needed, the trailers could easily be moved to an appropriate location by most any vehicle. As is usually the case, a lack of funding has prevented the plans from being fully implemented.

During the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the brave fire fighters and police and other first responders did what they could with what they had. It appeared that when it came to having the required medical equipment and supplies, they didn’t have enough which causes delays in treatment.

Soon after 9/11, the Federal Government spent millions of dollars on disaster preparedness. However, a significant portion of the funding was spent on hazardous materials and biological preparedness not everyday disasters. Ultimately, very little was spent on preparing for medical disasters. Within a few years of 9/11 the funding dried up and many people forgot about MCI, CCP and mass fatality incidents.

For any questions, you can contact us at
Disaster Preparedness Consultants
480-285-7555

In part 4 we start to have some fun discussing what needs to be done NOW?