CERT Classes
I teach a Spanish CERT class which is a FEMA class 4 times a year for Salt Lake Emergency Management.
This is a 7 week class that is 3 hours once a week
This helps normal people prepare for possible emergency situations.
When there is a large disaster such as an earthquake in our area our CERT teams self activate and begin to help each other as neighbors since emergency workers will be responding to hospitals, schools and large buildings before going into the neighborhoods.
In the event of a large earthquake most likely the cell phone systems will not function so we have plans for ham radios to be the primary communications.
I would strongly recommend that everyone take this class. At the end of the class you get some equipment, a vest and ID and this is the start of what we hope will turn into you encouraging others to take the class so when we do have an incident there will be enough trained people to help and take charge.
In my small area alone there are over 10,000 people and in that area we have a total of 12 firefighters which will be called to other areas so the residential areas will be on their own for quite some time. Fema changed the name of your 72 hour kit to a 96 hour kit and most likely that won’t cut it either.
Some of the training we get during those 21 hours of training is on the following:
6 Hours of first aid, training on light search and rescue, organization, putting out small fires with an extinguisher and a partner, much of what we teach is what not to do. There is training on lifting heavy objects off of people that are trapped and doing it safely. We train on several other items and you can find all of it on the FEMA.gov web site since the class is the same all over the US.