DISASTER PLANNING AND OPERATIONS
THE NORTHRIDGE EARTHQUAKE
This earthquake was a true test of our department’s members, apparatus, equipment, training, and planning. If experience is deemed to be the best teacher, we must have learned well through the past years of disasters.
The priorities established by an emergency organization for disaster management are the following:
- Protect life.
- Protect property.
- Protect the environment.
- Quickly and accurately assess the magnitude of an emergency.
- Alert and inform citizens of the situation.
- Evacuate and relocate citizens to a safe place.
- Provide for rapid restoration of services.
- Provide for recovery and rebuilding services.
- Mitigate the impact of future emergencies.
Each of these priorities was part of our department’s command-level planning process, response, and recovery operations and, in fact, involved the disaster management process of the city.
When the department went into its Earthquake Emergency Mode of operations, damage assessments began, communications were established, and command levels were decentralized. The incident command system was used for disaster management. Employing the area-command concept, we established three geographic command levels to cover the 470 square miles of the city, with branches, divisions, and groups corresponding with the location and functional requirements of the incident. Operations were supported at various levels to handle incident planning, logistics, and staff activities, including liaison and public information.
- Initial priorities for the department’s response included the following:
- Containment and control of the fires burning throughout the city.
- Search and rescue operations in the collapsed structures.
- Emergency medical treatment and transport of the injured.
- Providing water for firefighting in areas w ithout water.
- Recalling members to augment staffing of first-line apparatus, reserve apparatus, and specialized equipment (USAR) and to provide relief.
- Obtaining mutual-aid resources, including engine company strike teams, urban search and rescue resources, water tanker trucks, etc.
The city’s Emergency Operations Organization assisted the fire department as the lead agency in its response by providing police for evacuation and security; Building and Safety for structural assessment; Public Works for debris movement; General Services for logistical support; Department of Water and Pow’er and the Southern California Gas Company for utility control: Recreation and Parks, L.A. Unified School District, and the Red Cross for sheltering; and many more.
The fire department immediately accessed local, regional, state, and federal mutual-aid resources to assist in disaster operations. Specialized USAR resources- including single heavy rescue companies, all eight California USAR task forces (later designated FEMA task forces), and the alert of nine FEMA task forces-were requested from nearby fire departments.
