Search and Rescue - Haiti

PWEST

Watching the coverage of Haiti,

A lot of countries have sent urban search and rescue teams (including broke Iceland)

Do we have such a team that could practically save lives in disaster zones or has anyone proposed setting something up amongst all our fire services.

Surely such a team would be of real benefit to disaster areas as well as give Ireland an experienced team if their skills were ever needed closer to home.

I suppose it’s a naïve of me but financial constraint shouldn’t matter in this instance.

jerry2623

Yes we do actually. This team is set up by the Dept of Defense and run in conjunction with Foreign Affairs and is made up of all kinds of specialists

jerry2623

I was just about to post a thread on the amount of VIP'S and journalists arriving in Haiti when I read this article on the Examiner.
Bearing in mind there is only 1 runway and space for only 18 aircraft.It appears all the VIP'S and politicians are arriving to Haiti while the actual aid and medics are going through the Dominican Republic which is 24 hrs further away.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/terry-prone/narcissistic-hacks-and-others-do-haiti-a-favour-and-stay-away-109894.html

civdef

The Irish Rapid Response team is more relief focused, rather than initial search and rescue. When it was set up, the decision was taken to concentrate on the more specialist, logistics, engineering and healthcare areas, rather than rescue. Certainly the roles they concentrate on are vital for effective disaster response, but personally I believe USAR should also be looked at again.

The long and the short of it is that there is little or no USAR capability in the Republic, either for local or international response. If any serious building collapse occurred here, we would be depending on assistance from NI (where the fire service has an excellent USAR capability along with other parts of the UK) and from further afield. It's not an ideal situation.

Bosco boy

interesting! why have'nt we got these capabilities? while the need for this service here is unlikely we should be prepared and plan accordingly, I also agree that its people now like engineers (especially army), healthcare people and logistics people who will make a difference from here on in Haiti. The search and rescue period is closing fast. fair play to the people who have responded. The US army or a UN army/police should take over security/policing to allow some sort of structure is put in place to allow aid to reach everyone who needs it and restore law and order.

jerry2623

Bosco boy wrote: »

interesting! why have'nt we got these capabilities? while the need for this service here is unlikely we should be prepared and plan accordingly,

And how much should we put by to pay for this service? We seem to aggree we more than likely will never need this service. The country is hardly exactly awash with skyscrapers which will collapse any day soon

Bosco boy

God forbid if there was someone belonged to you or me trapped under a large hotel for example that had collapsed, we wouldnt be too concerned over the cost of the service that was required, we would want it straight away and demand to know why we didnt have it. If they can do it in the 6 counties of the north we should have the service here. ah! but sure it will never happen anyway! we'll wing it and get the council in with the jcb if needs be!

donvito99

jerry2623 wrote: »

And how much should we put by to pay for this service? We seem to aggree we more than likely will never need this service. The country is hardly exactly awash with skyscrapers which will collapse any day soon

I totally disaree, it was only last year that I think it was a load of scaffolding collapsed in Belfast and USAR was called in. I think we should have a full time unit in the capital, whether it is attached to DFB or some other body, maybe even Civil Defence.

ivabiggon

as far as i can remember the DFB are already currently been paid for it but never set it up!

donvito99

ivabiggon wrote: »

as far as i can remember the DFB are already currently been paid for it but never set it up!

Ha, thats Ireland for ya, can we do anything right?


Any who, back OT...

Odysseus

donvito99 wrote: »

I totally disaree, it was only last year that I think it was a load of scaffolding collapsed in Belfast and USAR was called in. I think we should have a full time unit in the capital, whether it is attached to DFB or some other body, maybe even Civil Defence.

As you know you won't get a full time unit with the CD, but they have set up a USAR unit with the past year, and its still early days yet, but training is ongoing.

Cliff Hanger

These guys are one of the UK teams that were over in Haiti. They're all back home now after what sounds like an interesting trip.

http://www.saraid.co.uk/

They're a charity but are able to provide a fully trained team. I imagine something like this would not work in Ireland unless a team were able to get some sort of serious corporate backing.

Interesting guys. I stayed with them when I was at the Emergency Services Show in Coventry back in November.

So are there no Structure Collapse type teams or USAR teams in the republic then?