The Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training program isn’t your typical class. It’s a hands-on course instructed by actual Kirkland firefighters who prepare ordinary citizens to take care of each other in the event of a natural disaster.
Residents of the Puget Sound region have been increasingly warned about an impending natural disaster in recent years, mostly with talk of a major earthquake or volcanic eruption.
The Nisqually earthquake back in 2001 did a decent job of indicating this, measuring 6.8 magnitude on the Richter scale. It also killed one person and injured more than 400. In response to this, the City of Kirkland offers an eight-week class that is geared toward preparing community members for the event of a natural disaster.
Karen Lightfeldt is a city volunteer in the Office of Emergency Management. She describes the training as a way to help residents respond to disasters where first responders who provide fire and medical services cannot meet the demand. She believes that more community members who know what to do if a catastrophe strikes will help the community thrive as a whole.
“It helps the public to be more aware of being prepared and confident in their ability to help,” Lightfeldt says. “Also, there are many statistics from other disasters where it was the volunteers who were injured, or worse, because they didn’t know how to protect themselves. The more CERTs we have in the community, the more prepared we are.”
And since Kirkland has nearly doubled in size due to last year’s annexation, Lightfeldt adds that it is the program’s goal to continue to offer classes and provide as many CERTs as possible.
Jeff Lyons, a recent CERT graduate and member of the CERT Steering Committee, felt that being able to learn from the firefighters who taught the class was a big benefit. Members of the class are shown how to properly extinguish a fire, how to safely search a disaster site, how to assess injuries and to set up facilities where the injured can be treated until professional care is available.
Lyons feels that many, including himself before taking the course, simply would not know the proper actions to take if a disaster were to happen.
“I think the average untrained but well-meaning person makes a number of assumptions about what they might do in the event of an emergency,” he said. “For the most part these assumptions may be honorable, but they’re often dead wrong and could simply lead to greater loss of life and limb than is necessary. What CERT teaches you is to analyze an emergency situation in a rational way, to keep yourself and your fellow responders safe, and to do the most good for the most people in whatever situation you’re in.”
Participants receive supplies throughout the course that will aid in the event of a disaster, and will even have the chance to put their newly acquired skills to work in a simulated volcanic eruption.
Christina Brugman strives to keep the skills taught in class as current as possible as the Kirkland CERT class coordinator. She is also an instructor. She feels the need for CERT classes because Kirkland simply doesn’t have the manpower to handle such a situation by relying on trained professionals alone.
“At any one time in Kirkland, there are only 19 first responders on duty … for a city of 80,000 people. If we have a major earthquake, they will be overwhelmed,” Brugman said. “The deputy fire chief likes to use the word ‘resilient community,’ and I think that having an adequate number of trained CERTs would go a long way toward making Kirkland resilient.”
More information
Registration is now open for the next CERT training class, which will begin on Sept. 17. For more information including cost and class schedules, visit www.kirklandwa.gov/CERT.
M.J. Hoecherl is a student in the University of Washington Department of Communication News Laboratory.
