Archives for August 2018

CERT Academy Graduates – August 2018

Congratulations to the latest class from the West Orange County CERT Academy — **Congratulations to the August 2018 class from the West Orange County CERT Academy**

Congratulations and a warm welcome to the 60 new CERT Academy graduates and thank each of you for showing up and digging in to the weekend. We all learned a lot and had some fun and met some new friends while we were at it.
And a HUGE thanks to all the CERT Members who met and planned in the days and weeks before the Academy helped make this terrific event possible and then during the four days at JFTB, Los Alamitos. The Team came out in force over the entire weekend to support the Academy and made it one of the best we have held.

The registration team lead by Jeanette Vella did a terrific job of getting the attendees to the Academy, checked in and out, and all the other administrative tasks needed to keep the records straight. Our Team instructors, Kris Moscowitz, Ed Fleming, and our dynamic physician team of Dr. Michell Ryan and Dr. Joe Horejsi who held pre-academy meetings to ensure the CERT Members helping with medical portions of the Academy were all on the same page and knew the high points to cover.

The Seal Beach Trailer Team lead by Ray Vella and Dave Atkins were there to support the Academy each day and the La Palma Trailer Team of Kris Moscowitz and Willie Ortega were on scene to assist with the final exercise. Of course, the Team shutter bugs Pat and Roberta O’Toole along with Art Remnet were snapping away. How does that go, if it isn’t recorded, it didn’t happen?

And it all starts with our coordinators Ed Fleming, Julia Clasby, Loree Erpelding, Ellen Lopez, Dan Brandt, and Aaron France who pulled together the facilities, logistics, and resources we needed. And we tip our hats and give thanks to the outside experts who shared their insights with the Academy: JFTB/Los Alamitos Fire; Robert Acosta, OCFA; OCFA Buena Park; the CARE EMTs (both Saturdays), Dr. Heather Williams, OCSD; and Josh Goldmark, OCIAC. And we appreciate the assistance of the JFTB command staff who allowed us to use their facilities.

In support and appreciation of the CERT program, each of the six cities comprising West County CERT was on hand to congratulate our latest Academy Graduates: Chief Rod Cox, Cypress; Chief Terry Kim, La Palma; Asst City Manager Buena Park Aaron France; Sgt Mike Henderson, Seal Beach; Sgt Kain Gallaugher, Los Alamitos; and Chief Ralph Ornelas, Westminster.

And to make our final exercise possible, the make-up artistry and skills of Marie Sorenson and the willing victims/actors Explorers from Seal Beach, Buena Park, and Orange were amazing.

The August 2018 CERT Academy Graduates

Congratulations to the August 2018 Graduating Class from the West Orange County CERT Academy — **Congratulations August 2018 Graduates!**

If you are interested in joining one of our upcoming CERT Academy programs or just want to find out more about CERT in your area, please let us know. You can find out more about the CERT Academy here or sign up for our CERT Academy notification list here.

Please note: the danger in thanking people by name is someone always gets left out. We appreciate everyone who helped make this Academy so terrific. If your name should have been listed, please accept our apologies.

CERT Academy – August 2018 – Weekend #2

On the second weekend we start off with a always great pot-luck dinner with the class and then dive into both disaster psychology and how CERT responds to terrorism (hint: report what you see happening and then leave the terrorist activity to the professionals) with some tips on how to keep yourself and family safe.

Ahh, the Friday evening pot-luck dinner. There's always more food choices than you can eat. This buffet was a terrific mix of homemade and store bought; comfort food and health options. Well done class!
Look a all those desserts! Wow!
Heather Williams talks about disaster trauma and 9/11 is a classic example of an event that traumatized an entire nation.
Break time with a beautiful full moon rising.
And then terrorism and CERT - what to look for and what to do (hint: call 9-1-1 and calmly leave the area - let the professionals deal with things.)

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Then Saturday morning we review what we have covered so far, get a good feel for how ICS works, run through an ICS exercise, and then start planning for the afternoon exercise where we use the skills we’ve acquired over the past 4 days to use in a disaster scenario.

One of the big take aways from the morning presentations is that “2 weeks is the new 3 days” when it comes to how long you need to be prepared to survive before “first responders” can provide assistance. You and your neighborhood are the first line of defense when it comes to post-disaster survival.

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CERT Academy – August 2018, Weekend #1

The first weekend of our August CERT Academy went very well with more than 60 participants taking part. If you have been watching our West County CERT Facebook group, you would have seen some near live updates from both Friday and Saturday. Check out the the fun photos from Friday evening and Saturday below.

Upcoming CERT Academy

If you are interested in participating in this top of the line CERT Academy, please get yourself on the notification list for our next course.

The Friday evening of our first weekend provides the basic background surrounding disaster preparedness and the core elements of the CERT Program: safety (self, family, and people nearby), teamwork, and your place in overall community emergency operations plan followed by some fun team building activities.

The pre-Academy setup to make sure everything is in order.
Registration Preparation
Registration begins as participants begin to arrive
Registration continues...
Ellen Lopez form Westminster talks with one of the Academy participants.
The classroom is filling up. We had 60+ participants
The City Coordinators: Ellen Lopez (Westminster), Loree Erpelding (Cypress), Julia Clasby (Seal Beach), Ed Fleming (La Palma), and Dan Brandt (Los Alamitos). Arron France (Buena Park) not pictured.
Participant Introductions.
The class is sworn in as FEMA Disaster Aid Workers
Doc Michelle taking care of important business.
Kris Moskowitz leads the Disaster Preparedness section
Break time
Loree and Julia explain the team building exercise...
...and the team start figuring things out...
...and building
and experimenting...
And a different approach...
Does size really matter?
Maybe this will work better?
Ahh, success?
Very stylish building.
Is this going to be tall enough?
ahh choo!
Reach way up there...
Focused attention.
Keep working
Keep at it - fold faster!
Great roof!
What did we learn?

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Our first Saturday kicks off with fire safety and one of the highlights for most CERT Academy participants, using a fire extinguisher to put out an actual fire. The fire safety section is followed by an afternoon of medical care training and hands on practice. It’s a busy day for the CERT Academy attendees.

Teams get their protective gear on and get ready for some last minute instructions.
With the shifting winds, the teams are lined up away from the buildings and the fire pots are lit.
Gotcha Mr. Fire. Ha!
This is a chair carry.
If you don't have a chair, you can use the two person carry.

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Dr. Michelle Ryan covers the basic medical triage approach with the class.
Dr Joe helps to demonstrate the proper use of a tourniquet - only use it on a limb and avoid using it on the neck. 😉
Tourniquet use used to be only recommended in extreme situations but more recent findings show tourniquets are effective more often.
Now, it's your turn....place the bandage on the wound...
This is how the tourniquet is put on a limb...strap it in place...
...and twist the stick until the bleeding has stopped.
Remember to always write the time you put the tourniquet in place and make the person's forehead with a "T" so the next medical station will know the person has a tourniquet and how long it has been in place.
Bandage practice.
Make sure to twist the bandage when crossing the wound to apply additional pressure.
This Team is about to practice splinting broken limbs using cardboard splints.
Wrap the bandage tight enough to hold the gauze in place and keep pressure on the wound.
When necessary a neck tie can be used as a bandage or a effective tourniquet.
Dr. Joe shows how to place a person in the recovery position
Apply direct pressure to the wound with sterile gauze.
Ways to use a splint...
Dr. Joe about to show how to perform a full head to toe inspection on Dr. Michelle
Say what now?
And now it's your turn class...
Start with the head and always check your gloves for blood as you may not always see the wound.
Check inside the mouth and around the neck looking for blood and obvious injuries.
Proceed down the torso looking for pain points or injury.

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We will be back next week with an update on the second weekend of the Academy.

Thanks to OCFA Truck 61 from Buena Park for stopping by to assist our search and rescue training and to the CARE EMTs who assisted in our medical training.