TVF&R's HazMat team sets up in Tillamook
It’s a quiet, sunny morning in Tillamook when the HazMat teams rollup to the Tillamook County Creamery Association headquarters. Fire apparatus from Tillamook, Bay City, Nehalem and others are on-scene as Hazardous Materials vehicles from TVF&R and Astoria arrive. A decontamination area is set up as men don outfits that look like space-suits and prepare to enter a building. What appears to be a major incident, though, is just a drill.
The Tillamook County Creamery Association (TCCA) asked regional Hazardous Materials teams to familiarize themselves with their operation because of the size of their facility. Although Tillamook is outside of TVF&R’s fire District, it falls within the District’s HazMat response area. As a regional HazMat responder, Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue is responsible for incidents within the state of Oregon’s ”Region 9,” which stretches from Scappoose to Salem, and from Lake Oswego to Astoria. The drill is a good opportunity for TVF&R’s HazMat team to learn about the TCCA facility, and it’s a good chance for the TCCA staff to learn about how TVF&R handles hazardous materials. The drill also allows various fire departments that would respond to an incident on the coast practice cooperating with each other.
The entry team prepares to enter the scenario building.
As the scenario progresses, TVF&R’s HazMat team arrives on the practice ground outside of the TCCA’s facility and begins to meticulously set up their gear. The team regularly responds to fires, spills, and other incidents involving chemicals or toxic materials. Team members practice constantly and, at exercises like the one in Tillamook, it shows. As the HazMat team leader assesses the situation and speaks to local first responders, the rest of the team prepares protective gear and sets up high-tech monitoring equipment. Soon, another HazMat team arrives from Astoria to act in a back-up capacity.
TVF&R's HazMat team practices inside a facility in Tigard
To the outsider, a HazMat response may seem slow, crews don’t race up to the scene of an incident and rush inside. Instead, they move deliberately to ensure the safety of the surrounding community by analyzing the threat and then preparing to safely mitigate it. HazMat team members don air-tight protective outfits that some say look like space suits. Each firefighter breathes air through a self contained breathing apparatus and is trained to do complex maneuvers in these bulky, strange looking suits.
The team develops a plan and ensures that at least two HazMat trained firefighters are geared up and prepared to act as a backup team in case something goes wrong. The entry team then enters the building and deals with the problem in the scenario. Team members are trained to rescue people trapped in dangerous, chemical filled environments. They also practice shutting off gas leaks and assessing chemical spills.
After the drill, the HazMat team debriefs with members of the TCCA’s staff, the Astoria HazMat team and the other fire departments from the Oregon coast. The drill is a good opportunity for all of these different agencies to get comfortable working together.
TVF&R’s HazMat team participates in interagency drills like this one often. Just two weeks after the drill in Tillamook, the team practiced at another facility in Tigard with the HazMat team from Salem. The scenario is similar, but each facility is different and those differences are what create valuable learning opportunities.
TVF&R's HazMat team practices with a team from Salem
