Following the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, many communities have been reviewing their emergency response plans.
\nTomorrow, at the Tyrone Municipal Building, local municipal workers will be taking part in the first Community Emergency Response Team training in the area.
\nThrough a grant from the Department of Homeland Security and administered by the Federal Emergency Management Administration, there will be four classes offered in Blair County and two in Fulton County.
\n\u201cThis program was developed in Los Angeles in 1985 by the L.A. Fire Department,\u201d said Cindy Whitby, one of the course instructors. \u201cThe idea was to have groups of citizens ready and trained to respond in the event of an earthquake or major disaster.\u201d
\nThe concept is a lot like the old civil defense program \u2013 to check up on your neighbor.
\n\u201cIf the electricity goes out, check next door and make sure your neighbor is OK,\u201d said Whitby. \u201cThis isn\u2019t a bunch of vigilantes. The people who will receive this training will only use it in the event of an emergency in which first responders are unable to arrive on the scene.\u201d
\nThe class in Tyrone runs tomorrow from 8:30 a.m. until 5:30 p.m. and the second phase of the class is March 22.
\n\u201cRight now, the class is being offered to municipal workers,\u201d said Whitby. \u201cOnce the municipalities get trained, the classes will be offered to members of the community. The municipalities have shown plenty of interest in the CERT program and it is something that is necessary following the terrorist attacks.\u201d
\nThe American Red Cross will teach a class on individual preparedness and tell the class members what needs to go into a 72-hour emergency pack.
\nDave Lynch will teach light search and rescue and a class will also be taught on fire supression.
\n\u201cI didn\u2019t know how to work a fire extinguisher until I had a fire, and buy then it is too late\u201d said Whitby. \u201cWe\u2019re going to teach the class members how to use a fire extinguisher and other things to help with safety around the home.\u201d
\nThe next class for municipal workers will take place Tuesday and Wednesday at Bon Secours Holy Family Hospital.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Following the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, many communities have been reviewing their emergency response plans. Tomorrow, at the Tyrone Municipal Building, local municipal workers will be taking part in the first Community Emergency Response Team training in the area. Through a grant from the Department of Homeland Security and administered by the Federal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news-in-the-tyrone-pennsylvania-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47186\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}