Friday, April 20, 2007
Nancy Rigg: Recipient for GBW Service to Society Award
The George B. Walter, '36, Service to Society Award
This award is presented to recognize alumni of Lawrence University or Milwaukee-Downer College who best exemplify the ideals of a liberal education through socially useful service in their community, the nation, and/or the world. This award honors George B. Walter, '36, alumnus, faculty member, educator, and dean of men, whose work at the college and beyond promoted his conviction that every individual can and should make a positive difference in her or his world.
Stay tuned for additional press releases on this well deserving award for Nancy!
This award is presented to recognize alumni of Lawrence University or Milwaukee-Downer College who best exemplify the ideals of a liberal education through socially useful service in their community, the nation, and/or the world. This award honors George B. Walter, '36, alumnus, faculty member, educator, and dean of men, whose work at the college and beyond promoted his conviction that every individual can and should make a positive difference in her or his world.
Stay tuned for additional press releases on this well deserving award for Nancy!
What we said in 1986
NEWSWEEK: The Marriage Crunch
go to this link for full story:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12940202/site/newsweek/
go to this link for full story:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12940202/site/newsweek/
PDF download from the UK
http://www.parliament.uk/post/e6.pdf
Click on this link to download the file
Click on this link to download the file
ART Magzine
Advanced Rescue Technology Magazine
August/September 2003
Vol. 6, No. 4
'A Successful Mission'
For the past 23 years, Los Angeles-based freelance author and frequent ART Magazine contributor Nancy Rigg has campaigned tirelessly to get adequate water rescue training, equipment and standards in place across the United States so that rescue personnel can stay safe while saving lives.
Her mission began following a personal tragedy. In 1980, her fiancé, Earl Higgins, drowned after jumping into a flood-swollen Los Angeles River to rescue a 12-year-old boy who had fallen into the raging waters. While the boy survived, Earl lost his life at the age of 29. The fact that Earl died during a major flood that claimed another 25 lives led Nancy to start asking questions regarding the capacity of local emergency services to respond to such events. It would take 12 years of questions before Los Angeles established a comprehensive multi-agency swiftwater/flood rescue program.
Nancy, who advocates the development of a federally sponsored network of flood rescue teams, was honored at the Higgins and Langley Memorial Awards in Flood and Swiftwater Rescue during NASAR's SAR conference in Reno, NV, in late May. The awards were created in 1993 by members of NASAR's Swiftwater Rescue Committee in honor of Earl Higgins and Jeffrey Langley, a firefighter/paramedic with the Los Angeles County Fire Department who lost his life in a helicopter incident in 1993, and who had worked with Nancy to develop a multiagency swiftwater flood rescue program in Los Angeles County before his death. Not only was Nancy surprised with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Higgins and Langley Committee, but she also received the SVC Distinguished Service Medal, only the second ever presented, for her efforts to improve the safety of swiftwater rescue.
At the awards ceremony, plans to organize the first annual Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge were announced. Proceeds from this premier event will help defray medical costs incurred by Nancy during a recent prolonged illness, with funds from the event in future years supporting the Higgins and Langley Awards. For more information on the Challenge, turn to page 16.
On behalf of the ART staff, I would like to congratulate Nancy on a job well done!
—Nancy Perry, Managing Editor
Nancy Rigg's testimony before a Congressional Hearing.
August/September 2003
Vol. 6, No. 4
'A Successful Mission'
For the past 23 years, Los Angeles-based freelance author and frequent ART Magazine contributor Nancy Rigg has campaigned tirelessly to get adequate water rescue training, equipment and standards in place across the United States so that rescue personnel can stay safe while saving lives.
Her mission began following a personal tragedy. In 1980, her fiancé, Earl Higgins, drowned after jumping into a flood-swollen Los Angeles River to rescue a 12-year-old boy who had fallen into the raging waters. While the boy survived, Earl lost his life at the age of 29. The fact that Earl died during a major flood that claimed another 25 lives led Nancy to start asking questions regarding the capacity of local emergency services to respond to such events. It would take 12 years of questions before Los Angeles established a comprehensive multi-agency swiftwater/flood rescue program.
Nancy, who advocates the development of a federally sponsored network of flood rescue teams, was honored at the Higgins and Langley Memorial Awards in Flood and Swiftwater Rescue during NASAR's SAR conference in Reno, NV, in late May. The awards were created in 1993 by members of NASAR's Swiftwater Rescue Committee in honor of Earl Higgins and Jeffrey Langley, a firefighter/paramedic with the Los Angeles County Fire Department who lost his life in a helicopter incident in 1993, and who had worked with Nancy to develop a multiagency swiftwater flood rescue program in Los Angeles County before his death. Not only was Nancy surprised with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Higgins and Langley Committee, but she also received the SVC Distinguished Service Medal, only the second ever presented, for her efforts to improve the safety of swiftwater rescue.
At the awards ceremony, plans to organize the first annual Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge were announced. Proceeds from this premier event will help defray medical costs incurred by Nancy during a recent prolonged illness, with funds from the event in future years supporting the Higgins and Langley Awards. For more information on the Challenge, turn to page 16.
On behalf of the ART staff, I would like to congratulate Nancy on a job well done!
—Nancy Perry, Managing Editor
Nancy Rigg's testimony before a Congressional Hearing.
FIRE RESCUE MAGAZINE
Swiftwater, Swift Rescue
By Nancy J. Rigg
After dozens of swiftwater fatalities, Los Angeles-area rescuers teamed to improve response
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
On Feb. 17, 1980, my fiancé, Earl Higgins, and I watched two young boys ride their bicycles perilously close to the edge of the flood-swollen Los Angeles River. One boy fell into the deluge and cried out for help. Instinctively, Earl stepped into the churning water to rescue him. The stark image of man and boy careening downstream at 25 mph haunts me still. The boy somehow managed to eddy out of the water, and firefighters located him several miles downstream. Earl was swept away; his remains were recovered an agonizing nine months later.
How did the boy survive? Where along the 30-mile stretch of river from Griffith Park to Long Beach did Earl succumb to the torrent's relentless power? And why weren't rescuers able to save him?
These questions lingered in my mind as I slowly rebuilt my life following the flood disaster that cost Earl and more than 30 other victims their lives.
In the early 1980s, Los Angeles endured several successive years of flooding. I counted the dead, wincing when the numbers climbed to more than a dozen one year and 16–18 the next. With few exceptions, everyone who slipped or fell into the maze of open, cement-lined flood control channels that crisscross Los Angeles perished.
Treading Water
On the first anniversary of Earl's death, I wrote an article for the Los Angeles Times in which I begged parents to mind their children when storms slam into Southern California. Los Angeles County Lifeguard Mickey Gallagher contacted me after reading the piece and confirmed my suspicions about the lack of a coordinated response plan for flood rescues in local inland flood-control channels and other waterways.
Gallagher explained that county lifeguards, who had water-rescue experience, were dispatched to incidents involving inland flooding. But deployed firefighters and police officers lacked the training necessary to do anything more than make lucky saves. Rescues were hit and miss, Gallagher says. "The flood control channels were a kind of no-man's land, and if someone got swept away, which happened every time we got heavy rains, their chance of survival was slim to none."
Gallagher and a handful of other Southern California lifeguards tried for several years to introduce swiftwater rescue training in Los Angeles. In the late '70s, Gallagher had met with Jim Segerstrom, a whitewater rescue and mountain search and rescue specialist in the process of establishing Rescue 3 International, a swiftwater rescue training business.
"We discussed ideas and tried various rescue techniques," Gallagher says. "Los Angeles County has 470 miles of cement-lined, open flood-control channels that wind through multiple jurisdictions. We knew that the only way to approach this was for all the public safety agencies to work together. But we just couldn't get enough attention focused on this problem."
Los Angeles County Fire Department (LACoFD) Captain Larry Collins also recognized the need to better train and equip firefighters. "In the '80s a lot of fire chiefs were reluctant to undertake swiftwater rescue as a responsibility," Collins says. "There was no mission statement or funding set by the county or local city charters that said we had to do this. There wasn't even any formal training available until Rescue 3 started to develop their program." However, after intense storms in 1982 and '83 killed more than a dozen people in flood control channels, Collins was tasked by his department to develop a swiftwater rescue program.
The same devastating storms also inspired the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) to experiment with a variety of progressive flood-rescue techniques and tools, including helicopters. "Pursuit rescues in flood-control channels are among the most difficult rescues to perform," Deputy Terry Ascherin of LASD's Emergency Services Detail (ESD) says. "For years no one was willing to admit that helicopters could play an important role in swiftwater rescues where the victim is being rapidly swept downstream." Ascherin credits LASD commanders at ESD and the department's Aero Bureau for allowing rescue paramedics and pilots to experiment in the '80s and "come up with new protocols for something that had never been done before."
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department was one of the first agencies to use helicopters for swiftwater rescues.
Droughts Delay Progress
In 1985, as a few individual agencies began to focus on swiftwater and flood-rescue training, a prolonged drought hit California and urgency to move forward waned. That changed in February 1992 when a punishing series of drought-busting storms pummeled Southern California from Ventura to San Diego counties. More than a dozen people were swept to their deaths. On Feb. 10, 50 motorists traveling on a main Los Angeles thoroughfare were abruptly trapped in rapidly rising floodwaters in the Sepulveda Basin, a multi-purpose flood-control area designed to capture storm runoff. The scramble to rescue them aired live on television. I was relieved to see Los Angeles County lifeguards using inflatable rescue boats to bring victims ashore. I was elated to see Los Angeles City Fire helicopters being deployed, and thrilled to see multiple agencies working together. I called Gallagher to congratulate him, leaving a message at lifeguard headquarters.
On Feb. 12, 15-year-old Adam Bischoff's fatal journey down the flood-swollen Los Angeles River shattered my illusions of a coordinated, multi-agency flood-rescue response. Adam had grown up during the blistering drought of the late 1980s and didn't recognize the danger when floodwaters filled an arroyo (water-carved channel) near his home. The mesmerizing surge drew Adam, and like other children before him, he slipped into the torrent. The current swept him helplessly downstream for more than 10 miles — past rescuers without the training or equipment to save him.
Adam's death also unfolded live on television, clearly and painfully broadcasting rescuers' lack of preparedness and mobilizing the community in a way that no earlier flood-related tragedy ever had. Adam's remains were recovered the next morning when floodwaters receded.
With encouragement from county lifeguards and Adam Bischoff's family and friends, I formed an ad-hoc citizens group to push for reform. We met with political leaders, who suddenly wanted to know why local emergency responders were so ill-prepared to handle inland water rescues. The Los Angeles City Council and County Board of Supervisors urged local fire-rescue and law enforcement agencies to standardize and coordinate swiftwater rescue training. Emergency funds were allocated to several agencies, including LACoFD, Los Angeles City Fire Department (LAFD), LASD and the county lifeguards to purchase much-needed equipment, train emergency responders and develop a flood-safety education program to warn children about the dangers of fast moving floodwaters.
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
More than 18 agencies comprise the Los Angeles County Swiftwater Rescue Committee. More than 7,500 fire-rescue, law enforcement and lifeguard personnel from Los Angeles-area agencies have received swiftwater rescue training following the committee’s guidelines.
Multi-Agency Swiftwater Committee
Under a directive from the Los Angeles City Council, an LAFD river rescue task force formed with LAFD Assistant Chief Tony Ennis at the helm. Its purpose: to develop training, equipment and interagency protocols for swiftwater and flood-rescue operations within the City of Los Angeles. Individual agencies developed internal protocols, but because flood victims frequently travel for miles downstream through multiple jurisdictions, a cohesive, countywide response plan proved necessary.
In 1993 a new committee — the Los Angeles County Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee — absorbed LAFD's river rescue task force. Under the leadership of the Los Angeles County Fire Department, the Swiftwater Rescue Committee had representatives from 18 fire-rescue, law enforcement and other government agencies. Working together, committee members developed the most comprehensive multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional swiftwater rescue program in the world. In addition to standardizing rescue training, developing new rescue equipment and techniques and establishing swiftwater rescue predeployment protocols, committee members helped the Los Angeles County Office of Education and Department of Public Works develop a pioneering, curriculum-based flood safety education program called No Way Out. The program uses videos and instructional materials to educate Los Angeles-area children about the dangers of flood-control channels. The No Way Out video is also used to educate rescuers, command personnel and other emergency responders about flood-safety awareness.
Captain Steve Wood of the Glendale Fire Department cites the Swiftwater Rescue Committee's Operational Standards and Guidelines document as one of its most important accomplishments. "This document is our play book," Wood says. "It identifies, right across the board, what the level of training should be, what the equipment should be, what the communications frequencies are, what helicopters will be assigned and how they will operate with the ground-based teams. We all train to these standards."
Using the committee's guidelines, more than 7,500 fire-rescue, law enforcement and lifeguard personnel from dozens of local public safety agencies have received swiftwater rescue training. Local fire academies have incorporated swiftwater rescue training into their standard curriculum. Fire-rescue, law enforcement personnel and lifeguards with advanced swiftwater rescue training serve on multi-agency swiftwater rescue teams, which predeploy in advance of major storms, patrol and monitor the channels during high risk times and respond to calls together to ensure a seamless, multi-jurisdictional response.
"Once a year the committee hosts a flood operations day when we work with helicopters from the four primary agencies that provide air support: LACoFD, LAFD, the Sheriff's Aero Bureau and the Glendale Police Air Support Unit," says Wood. "We work with personal watercraft and inflatable rescue boats, plus we do three days of intensive, in-water training where we practice contact rescues or swimming rescues. This annual training allows all the agencies to exchange ideas, information, rescue techniques and see one another again."
Flood control channels throughout Los Angeles County have been carefully mapped, with observation, flotation and rescue locations clearly identified. To enhance safety and provide sturdy anchor points for rescuers to attach ropes and other equipment during rescue operations, the committee worked with engineers from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works to design, build and install permanent anchoring and sliding devices at specific rescue points throughout the flood control-channel system. Civil Engineer James Yang served as project manager for the 18-month-long effort that began in February 1998. "Public Works completed installation of more than 700 rescue anchor devices at more than 100 strategic locations along the 470 miles of open flood control channels throughout Los Angeles," Yang says.
Innovation
While the Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee oversaw the development of countywide standards, individual agencies and rescuer-inventors contributed new ideas for equipment, rescue techniques and improved means for deployment. LASD's Terry Ascherin invented the SkyHook rescue system, including a rear-mounted harness for use in helicopter-based swiftwater rescue operations. LACoFD's Rick Cearley invented the Cearley Rescue Strap, which allows rescuers to more easily capture victims in swiftwater. LAFD swiftwater rescuers experimented with personal watercraft in the cement-lined Los Angeles River, countering skeptics who said it couldn't be done due to the water's high velocity and the debris churning in it.
One of the most innovative projects was a computer-aided flood rescue dispatch program developed by the LAFD. "As soon as a call-taker gets a call that someone's in the water, it immediately gets the attention of everyone on the dispatch floor," says Kathy Evansen, LAFD senior systems analyst. The computer is programmed to calculate a victim's speed and automatically deploys swiftwater rescue units downstream. "At least two helicopters respond along with ground-based first responders and swiftwater rescue teams," Evansen says. "And other agencies downstream with swiftwater rescue teams are notified immediately to move their assets into place."
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
In swiftwater training drills, rescuers hone their skills by "saving" each other.
Beyond Los Angeles
"A lot of communities nationwide are watching our program," LACoFD's Collins says. "We've demonstrated that the multi-agency approach works, giving viable victims every reasonable chance to be rescued. But we need to go beyond Los Angeles County."
Although the State of California Office of Emergency Services used the Los Angeles Swiftwater Rescue model to develop the first statewide swiftwater and flood rescue program, Collins sees a need to take this concept nationwide. "For major disasters, there is a discussion about how the FEMA Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) task forces can and should be used in situations like hurricanes and floods," Collins says. "I've had some fairly heated discussions about how the USAR task forces should be 'all-risk.' If there are people who physically need to be rescued in a disaster, and the local jurisdictions need extra support, the task force teams should be ready to respond."
LAFD Fire Captain Ernesto Ojeda agrees. "FEMA moved quickly to get all the USAR
Task Force teams geared up for terrorism, but for all the flooding over the past 10 years, with hundreds and hundreds of deaths nationwide, they haven't budged. We need the equivalent of a giant, nationwide swiftwater and flood rescue program, with specifications including how to operate with helicopters, how to use the incident command system in major floods and hurricanes, and how to establish standards for training. FEMA considers flooding a 'local problem.' Well, if you look at it this way, Sept. 11 was a 'local problem,' too. This doesn't make any sense."
Conclusion
According to members of the Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee, other departments — especially those in flood-prone areas — may wish to take a look at what agencies in Los Angeles have accomplished with teamwork. "Los Angeles has created a new standard of care for swiftwater and flood rescue," Gallagher says. "For the safety and protection of rescue personnel, as well as to improve service to their citizens, other communities may want to take a look at what we've done and modify our program to fit their needs."
"We're willing to share anything that we've got," Wood says. "We've done a lot of presentations for smaller fire and police agencies interested in developing programs of their own. We've laid a great foundation. Nobody needs to reinvent the wheel. Other agencies can take our book, build a committee around that, and adapt our program to the needs in their region."
For more information on the Swiftwater Rescue Committee and a copy of its Operational Standards and Guidelines, visit www.lacofd.org/swiftwat.htm.
Model of Success
In years with heavy rainfall, agencies throughout Los Angeles County average more than 100 swiftwater rescue calls. Although there have been a few fatalities since the inception of the Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee, all viable victims have been safely rescued, and responders have executed some spectacular rescues:
Seventeen people were swept down the Pacoima Wash during the spring of 1995, including 7-year-old Jason Bastain. Los Angeles Police Officer Mike Grasso and an unidentified 20-year-old man entered the water to save the boy. The force of the water overwhelmed all three individuals. LAFD first responders, using shore-based swiftwater rescue techniques, rescued all three victims, along with the other 14 unfortunate people who thought the narrow, vertical-walled channel looked like a fun place to play.
In January 1997, construction workers Mark Zarbis and Jose Nunez took a wild ride on top of a 45,000-pound, fully loaded cement truck as it hurtled down the flood-ravaged Los Angeles River. Several other construction workers scrambled under bridges for safety. LAFD first responders and swiftwater rescuers responded, along with LASD's Air Rescue 5 helicopter swiftwater rescue team. The helicopter hoisted Zarbis and Nunez off the cement truck after it plowed into a bridge abutment. All victims were safely rescued.
In March 1998, 13-year-old Megan Cole tried to grab her 14-year-old friend, Jennifer Simpson, after Jennifer fell into Bull Creek. Both girls helplessly traveled more than five miles downstream. LAFD first responders found Simpson clinging to a bridge, but like Adam Bischoff, Cole free-floated downstream in the quick current. LAFD helicopter swiftwater rescuers short-hauled the girl out of the water.
In April 2000, during an unusually strong spring rainstorm, 14-year-old Abel Flores and 15-year-old Daniel Rivera were swept down Little Dalton Wash. With dangerous high-tension wires, bridges and other obstructions crossing the verticalwalled channel, precise, well-orchestrated rescue operations proved imperative. LACoFD first responders used an inflated fire hose to separate the boys, who were clinging to one another as they headed toward a deadly strainer gate. LASD's Air Rescue 5 swiftwater rescue team hoisted one boy out and quickly circled back just in time to save the second boy who was within 100 feet of the strainer.
Nancy Rigg is a writer, documentary filmmaker and public education consultant in Los Angeles.
http://www.firerescue1.com/firerescue-magazine/20-5/111917/
By Nancy J. Rigg
After dozens of swiftwater fatalities, Los Angeles-area rescuers teamed to improve response
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
On Feb. 17, 1980, my fiancé, Earl Higgins, and I watched two young boys ride their bicycles perilously close to the edge of the flood-swollen Los Angeles River. One boy fell into the deluge and cried out for help. Instinctively, Earl stepped into the churning water to rescue him. The stark image of man and boy careening downstream at 25 mph haunts me still. The boy somehow managed to eddy out of the water, and firefighters located him several miles downstream. Earl was swept away; his remains were recovered an agonizing nine months later.
How did the boy survive? Where along the 30-mile stretch of river from Griffith Park to Long Beach did Earl succumb to the torrent's relentless power? And why weren't rescuers able to save him?
These questions lingered in my mind as I slowly rebuilt my life following the flood disaster that cost Earl and more than 30 other victims their lives.
In the early 1980s, Los Angeles endured several successive years of flooding. I counted the dead, wincing when the numbers climbed to more than a dozen one year and 16–18 the next. With few exceptions, everyone who slipped or fell into the maze of open, cement-lined flood control channels that crisscross Los Angeles perished.
Treading Water
On the first anniversary of Earl's death, I wrote an article for the Los Angeles Times in which I begged parents to mind their children when storms slam into Southern California. Los Angeles County Lifeguard Mickey Gallagher contacted me after reading the piece and confirmed my suspicions about the lack of a coordinated response plan for flood rescues in local inland flood-control channels and other waterways.
Gallagher explained that county lifeguards, who had water-rescue experience, were dispatched to incidents involving inland flooding. But deployed firefighters and police officers lacked the training necessary to do anything more than make lucky saves. Rescues were hit and miss, Gallagher says. "The flood control channels were a kind of no-man's land, and if someone got swept away, which happened every time we got heavy rains, their chance of survival was slim to none."
Gallagher and a handful of other Southern California lifeguards tried for several years to introduce swiftwater rescue training in Los Angeles. In the late '70s, Gallagher had met with Jim Segerstrom, a whitewater rescue and mountain search and rescue specialist in the process of establishing Rescue 3 International, a swiftwater rescue training business.
"We discussed ideas and tried various rescue techniques," Gallagher says. "Los Angeles County has 470 miles of cement-lined, open flood-control channels that wind through multiple jurisdictions. We knew that the only way to approach this was for all the public safety agencies to work together. But we just couldn't get enough attention focused on this problem."
Los Angeles County Fire Department (LACoFD) Captain Larry Collins also recognized the need to better train and equip firefighters. "In the '80s a lot of fire chiefs were reluctant to undertake swiftwater rescue as a responsibility," Collins says. "There was no mission statement or funding set by the county or local city charters that said we had to do this. There wasn't even any formal training available until Rescue 3 started to develop their program." However, after intense storms in 1982 and '83 killed more than a dozen people in flood control channels, Collins was tasked by his department to develop a swiftwater rescue program.
The same devastating storms also inspired the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) to experiment with a variety of progressive flood-rescue techniques and tools, including helicopters. "Pursuit rescues in flood-control channels are among the most difficult rescues to perform," Deputy Terry Ascherin of LASD's Emergency Services Detail (ESD) says. "For years no one was willing to admit that helicopters could play an important role in swiftwater rescues where the victim is being rapidly swept downstream." Ascherin credits LASD commanders at ESD and the department's Aero Bureau for allowing rescue paramedics and pilots to experiment in the '80s and "come up with new protocols for something that had never been done before."
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department was one of the first agencies to use helicopters for swiftwater rescues.
Droughts Delay Progress
In 1985, as a few individual agencies began to focus on swiftwater and flood-rescue training, a prolonged drought hit California and urgency to move forward waned. That changed in February 1992 when a punishing series of drought-busting storms pummeled Southern California from Ventura to San Diego counties. More than a dozen people were swept to their deaths. On Feb. 10, 50 motorists traveling on a main Los Angeles thoroughfare were abruptly trapped in rapidly rising floodwaters in the Sepulveda Basin, a multi-purpose flood-control area designed to capture storm runoff. The scramble to rescue them aired live on television. I was relieved to see Los Angeles County lifeguards using inflatable rescue boats to bring victims ashore. I was elated to see Los Angeles City Fire helicopters being deployed, and thrilled to see multiple agencies working together. I called Gallagher to congratulate him, leaving a message at lifeguard headquarters.
On Feb. 12, 15-year-old Adam Bischoff's fatal journey down the flood-swollen Los Angeles River shattered my illusions of a coordinated, multi-agency flood-rescue response. Adam had grown up during the blistering drought of the late 1980s and didn't recognize the danger when floodwaters filled an arroyo (water-carved channel) near his home. The mesmerizing surge drew Adam, and like other children before him, he slipped into the torrent. The current swept him helplessly downstream for more than 10 miles — past rescuers without the training or equipment to save him.
Adam's death also unfolded live on television, clearly and painfully broadcasting rescuers' lack of preparedness and mobilizing the community in a way that no earlier flood-related tragedy ever had. Adam's remains were recovered the next morning when floodwaters receded.
With encouragement from county lifeguards and Adam Bischoff's family and friends, I formed an ad-hoc citizens group to push for reform. We met with political leaders, who suddenly wanted to know why local emergency responders were so ill-prepared to handle inland water rescues. The Los Angeles City Council and County Board of Supervisors urged local fire-rescue and law enforcement agencies to standardize and coordinate swiftwater rescue training. Emergency funds were allocated to several agencies, including LACoFD, Los Angeles City Fire Department (LAFD), LASD and the county lifeguards to purchase much-needed equipment, train emergency responders and develop a flood-safety education program to warn children about the dangers of fast moving floodwaters.
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
More than 18 agencies comprise the Los Angeles County Swiftwater Rescue Committee. More than 7,500 fire-rescue, law enforcement and lifeguard personnel from Los Angeles-area agencies have received swiftwater rescue training following the committee’s guidelines.
Multi-Agency Swiftwater Committee
Under a directive from the Los Angeles City Council, an LAFD river rescue task force formed with LAFD Assistant Chief Tony Ennis at the helm. Its purpose: to develop training, equipment and interagency protocols for swiftwater and flood-rescue operations within the City of Los Angeles. Individual agencies developed internal protocols, but because flood victims frequently travel for miles downstream through multiple jurisdictions, a cohesive, countywide response plan proved necessary.
In 1993 a new committee — the Los Angeles County Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee — absorbed LAFD's river rescue task force. Under the leadership of the Los Angeles County Fire Department, the Swiftwater Rescue Committee had representatives from 18 fire-rescue, law enforcement and other government agencies. Working together, committee members developed the most comprehensive multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional swiftwater rescue program in the world. In addition to standardizing rescue training, developing new rescue equipment and techniques and establishing swiftwater rescue predeployment protocols, committee members helped the Los Angeles County Office of Education and Department of Public Works develop a pioneering, curriculum-based flood safety education program called No Way Out. The program uses videos and instructional materials to educate Los Angeles-area children about the dangers of flood-control channels. The No Way Out video is also used to educate rescuers, command personnel and other emergency responders about flood-safety awareness.
Captain Steve Wood of the Glendale Fire Department cites the Swiftwater Rescue Committee's Operational Standards and Guidelines document as one of its most important accomplishments. "This document is our play book," Wood says. "It identifies, right across the board, what the level of training should be, what the equipment should be, what the communications frequencies are, what helicopters will be assigned and how they will operate with the ground-based teams. We all train to these standards."
Using the committee's guidelines, more than 7,500 fire-rescue, law enforcement and lifeguard personnel from dozens of local public safety agencies have received swiftwater rescue training. Local fire academies have incorporated swiftwater rescue training into their standard curriculum. Fire-rescue, law enforcement personnel and lifeguards with advanced swiftwater rescue training serve on multi-agency swiftwater rescue teams, which predeploy in advance of major storms, patrol and monitor the channels during high risk times and respond to calls together to ensure a seamless, multi-jurisdictional response.
"Once a year the committee hosts a flood operations day when we work with helicopters from the four primary agencies that provide air support: LACoFD, LAFD, the Sheriff's Aero Bureau and the Glendale Police Air Support Unit," says Wood. "We work with personal watercraft and inflatable rescue boats, plus we do three days of intensive, in-water training where we practice contact rescues or swimming rescues. This annual training allows all the agencies to exchange ideas, information, rescue techniques and see one another again."
Flood control channels throughout Los Angeles County have been carefully mapped, with observation, flotation and rescue locations clearly identified. To enhance safety and provide sturdy anchor points for rescuers to attach ropes and other equipment during rescue operations, the committee worked with engineers from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works to design, build and install permanent anchoring and sliding devices at specific rescue points throughout the flood control-channel system. Civil Engineer James Yang served as project manager for the 18-month-long effort that began in February 1998. "Public Works completed installation of more than 700 rescue anchor devices at more than 100 strategic locations along the 470 miles of open flood control channels throughout Los Angeles," Yang says.
Innovation
While the Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee oversaw the development of countywide standards, individual agencies and rescuer-inventors contributed new ideas for equipment, rescue techniques and improved means for deployment. LASD's Terry Ascherin invented the SkyHook rescue system, including a rear-mounted harness for use in helicopter-based swiftwater rescue operations. LACoFD's Rick Cearley invented the Cearley Rescue Strap, which allows rescuers to more easily capture victims in swiftwater. LAFD swiftwater rescuers experimented with personal watercraft in the cement-lined Los Angeles River, countering skeptics who said it couldn't be done due to the water's high velocity and the debris churning in it.
One of the most innovative projects was a computer-aided flood rescue dispatch program developed by the LAFD. "As soon as a call-taker gets a call that someone's in the water, it immediately gets the attention of everyone on the dispatch floor," says Kathy Evansen, LAFD senior systems analyst. The computer is programmed to calculate a victim's speed and automatically deploys swiftwater rescue units downstream. "At least two helicopters respond along with ground-based first responders and swiftwater rescue teams," Evansen says. "And other agencies downstream with swiftwater rescue teams are notified immediately to move their assets into place."
PHOTO JOHN DE LEON
In swiftwater training drills, rescuers hone their skills by "saving" each other.
Beyond Los Angeles
"A lot of communities nationwide are watching our program," LACoFD's Collins says. "We've demonstrated that the multi-agency approach works, giving viable victims every reasonable chance to be rescued. But we need to go beyond Los Angeles County."
Although the State of California Office of Emergency Services used the Los Angeles Swiftwater Rescue model to develop the first statewide swiftwater and flood rescue program, Collins sees a need to take this concept nationwide. "For major disasters, there is a discussion about how the FEMA Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) task forces can and should be used in situations like hurricanes and floods," Collins says. "I've had some fairly heated discussions about how the USAR task forces should be 'all-risk.' If there are people who physically need to be rescued in a disaster, and the local jurisdictions need extra support, the task force teams should be ready to respond."
LAFD Fire Captain Ernesto Ojeda agrees. "FEMA moved quickly to get all the USAR
Task Force teams geared up for terrorism, but for all the flooding over the past 10 years, with hundreds and hundreds of deaths nationwide, they haven't budged. We need the equivalent of a giant, nationwide swiftwater and flood rescue program, with specifications including how to operate with helicopters, how to use the incident command system in major floods and hurricanes, and how to establish standards for training. FEMA considers flooding a 'local problem.' Well, if you look at it this way, Sept. 11 was a 'local problem,' too. This doesn't make any sense."
Conclusion
According to members of the Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee, other departments — especially those in flood-prone areas — may wish to take a look at what agencies in Los Angeles have accomplished with teamwork. "Los Angeles has created a new standard of care for swiftwater and flood rescue," Gallagher says. "For the safety and protection of rescue personnel, as well as to improve service to their citizens, other communities may want to take a look at what we've done and modify our program to fit their needs."
"We're willing to share anything that we've got," Wood says. "We've done a lot of presentations for smaller fire and police agencies interested in developing programs of their own. We've laid a great foundation. Nobody needs to reinvent the wheel. Other agencies can take our book, build a committee around that, and adapt our program to the needs in their region."
For more information on the Swiftwater Rescue Committee and a copy of its Operational Standards and Guidelines, visit www.lacofd.org/swiftwat.htm.
Model of Success
In years with heavy rainfall, agencies throughout Los Angeles County average more than 100 swiftwater rescue calls. Although there have been a few fatalities since the inception of the Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Committee, all viable victims have been safely rescued, and responders have executed some spectacular rescues:
Seventeen people were swept down the Pacoima Wash during the spring of 1995, including 7-year-old Jason Bastain. Los Angeles Police Officer Mike Grasso and an unidentified 20-year-old man entered the water to save the boy. The force of the water overwhelmed all three individuals. LAFD first responders, using shore-based swiftwater rescue techniques, rescued all three victims, along with the other 14 unfortunate people who thought the narrow, vertical-walled channel looked like a fun place to play.
In January 1997, construction workers Mark Zarbis and Jose Nunez took a wild ride on top of a 45,000-pound, fully loaded cement truck as it hurtled down the flood-ravaged Los Angeles River. Several other construction workers scrambled under bridges for safety. LAFD first responders and swiftwater rescuers responded, along with LASD's Air Rescue 5 helicopter swiftwater rescue team. The helicopter hoisted Zarbis and Nunez off the cement truck after it plowed into a bridge abutment. All victims were safely rescued.
In March 1998, 13-year-old Megan Cole tried to grab her 14-year-old friend, Jennifer Simpson, after Jennifer fell into Bull Creek. Both girls helplessly traveled more than five miles downstream. LAFD first responders found Simpson clinging to a bridge, but like Adam Bischoff, Cole free-floated downstream in the quick current. LAFD helicopter swiftwater rescuers short-hauled the girl out of the water.
In April 2000, during an unusually strong spring rainstorm, 14-year-old Abel Flores and 15-year-old Daniel Rivera were swept down Little Dalton Wash. With dangerous high-tension wires, bridges and other obstructions crossing the verticalwalled channel, precise, well-orchestrated rescue operations proved imperative. LACoFD first responders used an inflated fire hose to separate the boys, who were clinging to one another as they headed toward a deadly strainer gate. LASD's Air Rescue 5 swiftwater rescue team hoisted one boy out and quickly circled back just in time to save the second boy who was within 100 feet of the strainer.
Nancy Rigg is a writer, documentary filmmaker and public education consultant in Los Angeles.
http://www.firerescue1.com/firerescue-magazine/20-5/111917/
Story Circle Network
LifeWriters Talk About LifeWriting
Nancy Rigg: Her Story Helps Save Lives
(09/04, Vol. 8, Number 3)
In 1980, Nancy Rigg had recently moved to Los Angeles CA from Colorado with her tall, handsome fiancé, Earl Higgins. They were looking forward to marriage and to working together as writers and filmmakers. But unprecedented floods in February swept away her fiancé and her dreams and changed Nancy's life forever.
Torrential rains had been battering LA for several days, but finally the sky cleared and Nancy and Earl took their dog for a walk. As they crossed a high footbridge spanning the flood-swollen Los Angeles River, Earl and Nancy saw a 12-year-old boy jump into the roiling water to recover his bicycle, which had been caught by the powerful current and pulled in. In a moment the boy was being swept away. Earl ran to the edge of the river to try and save him, but, when he too stepped into the water, he was quickly swept downstream to his death. (Nancy vividly describes the events of that fateful day in her article in the February 2001 issue of the Story Circle Journal.)
Nancy has devoted the past 20 years to promoting swiftwater rescue safety throughout the US and to educating the public about the dangers of flood waters. Just this summer, the TV show "Tactical to Practical" on the History Channel featured a segment on swiftwater rescue and included an interview with Nancy.
At our February 2004 Story Circle Conference, Nancy was the facilitator for the panel on "The Power of Story." In this interview, Nancy talks about the different ways she has told her story and how she has used its emotional power to create change.
Story Circle Journal: In your account of the events surrounding Earl's death, you tell how you were suddenly faced with the question: "Who am I now that I am no longer 'Earl and Nancy'?" How were you able to answer this question?
Nancy Rigg: When you lose a spouse suddenly, whether it's due to death or divorce, there comes a point when you discover that you need to redefine yourself now that you are no longer a 'couple'. This is true even with the most loving and independent couples. For me, a piece of my heart disappeared with Earl down that river and the impact was profound on many levels, including my identity.
When you love someone deeply there is a subtle blending. You mesh on so many levels, that having that person torn away from you abruptly represents loss on many levels. I never realized until he was gone how much Earl and I had blended. Losing him meant losing an intrinsic connection to myself. For this reason it was a shock when I found myself staring at a stranger in the mirror after Earl died.
It took time for me to understand that with or without my partnership with Earl, I still had a lot of useful work to do during my time left on earth.
SCJ: In the months right after Earl's death, what was the usual reaction to your story and how did you deal with the reactions that you got?
NR: Because Earl and I had moved to Los Angeles only six weeks before he got killed, I did not have a wide group of friends or family living here who could lend support and quietly listen when I needed to talk. Although Hollywood routinely exploits tragedy, people in the film business aren't "allowed" to experience it themselves.
Earl and I had moved to LA to build careers in mainstream Hollywood film and television production, but we had not yet become established in our careers when he died. In fact neither of us had found a job yet. After Earl was swept away, I was determined to remain in the area until everything related to his death was resolved, including the recovery of his remains. Because this was a prolonged process that ended up taking nine months, I needed to keep myself afloat financially, so I had to get out and look for work. This proved difficult on many levels, not the least of which was that grief hovered over me like a huge, black cloud.
Being an "unmarried widow" also put me in an unusual position as I moved into the world again. I found that being a real-life tragic heroine is anything but welcome at film screenings, job interviews, and dinner parties. The common response in those early days was, "Oh, your boyfriend died? That is so sad, but you're young, you'll find someone new."
Rather than attempt to reason with people who were clearly clueless about matters of life and death, I eventually learned to bear my sorrow in silence. My journal became my lifeline, because part of the healing process involves expressing what happened, working through the grief, exploring the trauma, and charting a future course through life. Those first nine months after Earl disappeared and before his remains were finally recovered were the loneliest I've ever known in my life.
SCJ: Tell us how you began to tell your story in the media.
NR: The first time I wrote an article about Earl's death and its powerful lessons was when the first anniversary of his death was approaching in 1981. It was the rainy season again and a crushing sense of grief and concern was consuming me as torrential rainstorms slammed into LA again. I knew that other children and would-be rescuers were still at risk and, unless warnings were sounded, someone else was going to get killed. Compelled to speak out, I wrote an article begging parents to warn their children to avoid flood-swollen rivers and flood control channels.
I was so determined to be heard that I called the Los Angeles Times, got the name of the op-ed editor, and drove downtown to hand deliver my typed article to her! I'll never forget the astonished look on her face. But time was of the essence and I was determined not to have my story lost in the "unsolicited manuscript" pile. This article, called "A Valentine to One Who Cared," was published as a guest editorial on Valentine's Day 1981.
Because of the article, I was contacted by the LA County Lifeguards, who had been trying for years to implement an inland flood rescue program. It was through meeting with the lifeguards that I launched my quest to establish a comprehensive swiftwater and flood rescue program in LA, never realizing what a monumental and lengthy task it would be.
When we entered a seven-year-long period of drought, my efforts all but dried up. I focused on healing and moving ahead with my life but I always knew there would be another trip-wire that would re-open the issue of swiftwater rescue.
SCJ: How did your story help reopen public awareness of the need for swiftwater rescue?
NR: In 1992, as the 12th anniversary of Earl's death approached, the long seven years of drought ended with torrential flooding and a 15-year old boy named Adam Bischoff was swept down the Los Angeles River in a journey hauntingly similar to Earl's. This time, due to advances in technology, the haphazard, scrambled rescue attempt aired live on television, clearly showing that rescuers had no plan in place to deal with incidents like this. Emotionally shattered, I paged through my old grief journals and found the name of the county lifeguard who had contacted me ages ago and called him. He asked me, "Will you speak out; will you tell your story?"
The LA City Council was pressed into holding public hearings. This marked the first time I spoke out before a government body. I was later told that my personal testimony had an immediate, profound effect on political leaders and emergency responders alike. If these hearings had ended up being a one-shot deal to placate the community before things went back to the old status quo, the swiftwater rescue program would never have been developed. My testimony evidently helped propel the issue forward.
SCJ: You began being asked to do TV interviews.
NR: Yes. As a result of television and newspaper interviews coordinated by the LA County Lifeguards, I found myself serving as a spokesperson for the many families of victims who had lost their lives in swirling floodwaters. Adam Bischoff's family also contacted me and asked to join with me to create change. Together, we took on the LA City Council and County Board of Supervisors to raise awareness and secure funding for the pioneering LA County Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Task Force, the first of its kind in the nation.
Drawing on my background as a writer and documentary filmmaker, I was asked to produce the first flood safety education video aimed at educating children about the dangers of fast moving floodwaters. This video, No Way Out, was distributed to schools throughout LA County and is still in use today.
SCJ: What opportunities and challenges did TV offer you?
NR: As I focused on ensuring that our new swiftwater rescue program survived budget cuts and other pressures that threatened to derail it during those first few years, the cable television industry "discovered" a new market that I call "rescuetainment," mining "exciting" television news footage and re-telling rescue stories. As a result, I found myself serving as the subject of several documentary TV programs focusing on flooding. I also co-produced a special for the Discovery Channel, which helped propel swiftwater and flood rescue onto the national stage.
I've always tried to remain open to opportunities to share my personal story in an effort to create awareness and change. But I've been very selective when choosing whom to work with and be interviewed by to avoid having Earl's last moments on earth be exploited for the sake of "rescuetainment" only. I've long been relieved that his death was not captured by news cameras back in 1980. It was bad enough to lose Earl once, but to have his death replayed again and again would have been tormenting.
SCJ: You've also told your story before Congress.
NR: That was in 2000. I was asked by a US Congressman to appear as a witness before a Congressional sub-committee that was studying why so many lives are lost in floods and what can be done to reduce the death toll. Standing before this committee in Washington, DC, one day before the 20th anniversary of Earl's death was like coming full circle.
I never intentionally set out to become a national spokesperson for flood safety education and swiftwater rescue. But someone needed to speak out for those whose voices were silenced too soon. Other families were unable or unwilling to step forward, so the task fell to me. I am proud to have allowed my personal story to be a transforming event that is now helping to save lives not just nationwide, but worldwide.
SCJ: How do print and visual media differ, in your experience?
NR: I love both the written word and the world of moving images. With words, you paint pictures that are powerful and compelling. You, and a good editor and publisher, are in charge of how the story will be presented. The process is relatively self-contained.
Unless you're a celebrity, with automatic name recognition, or you have the means to self-publish, it is a challenge in today's market to get a personal memoir published. I'm still working on this.
In documentary film and television production, the spoken word is important, but visual images really carry the story. The danger with television news footage is exploiting tragedies that belong to other families. As a writer, producer, and director, I have to approach this work very mindfully and carefully. Unfortunately, the entertainment industry is not known for its mindfulness, so creating meaningful, personal documentary projects is also a challenge.
Film and television production is also more collaborative than writing for the print media. Unless you're independently wealthy and can have the final say about how the program lays out, your work is subject not only to budgetary constraints, but also to opinions and input from every executive and filmmaker wannabe working up and down the production food chain.
Any meaningful creative project includes intrinsic challenges. When you make the leap from an idea to full production or publication, you simply have to be persistent and make choices based on your personal sense of integrity. As an artist, I believe in truth and simplicity. Regardless of whether it's a television or film documentary, a newspaper or magazine article, or a published book, I believe in letting the story tell itself. Keep it simple. By that I mean: you don't need to clutter up your documentary with fancy special effects or a thundering underscore or to twist what people say out of context to fit your preconceived notions. The same applies to articles and books. Keep it simple.
SCJ: Tell us about a time when your story had an immediate and profound effect on your listeners and changed their actions?
NR: I was asked to speak to a fire department that was in the process of developing a new swiftwater rescue program. The fire captain encouraged me to go into detail about how I was treated by on scene firefighters when Earl disappeared.
I quietly recounted how I was first yelled at by the firefighters who had to use bolt cutters to free me from the fenced-in area downstream where I had run along the levee, chasing after Earl and the boy, dragging my poor English Springer Spaniel behind me.
Then they totally ignored me while they joked and drank coffee leaning casually on their fire engine. They left me shivering with emotional shock and mild hypothermia in a downpour of rain, with no umbrella, jacket, blanket, or other protection, waiting for news of the rescue operations.
And when they finally called off the search and the fire engine pulled away, they left me standing alone by the river in a city I was totally unfamiliar with, stranded more than two miles downstream from where Earl entered the water, with no money, no keys to the apartment (our keys were in Earl's pocket) and no friend or family member to call for help.
About a week after recounting this story, the fire captain called and said, "You've ruined them! After listening to you talk, my guys have never been nicer. They can't do enough for the families of patients we transport to the hospital or when we go on a rescue call. They're taking too long to get the work done and they're driving me crazy!" We both had a good laugh over this.
To their credit, the majority of emergency responders in today's world are far more attuned to the needs of "secondary victims," including witnesses and family members, even as they make every effort to attend to the "primary victim," the actual person needing emergency care.
SCJ: You've talked about wanting to write your story as a way of promoting healing among survivors of disasters. And you were instrumental in advocating for fiancés of survivors of 9/11. Tell us more about this.
NR: There are virtually no personal memoirs about surviving natural disasters, let alone man-made ones like the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. I moderate online peer support groups for survivors of disasters and families who have lost loved ones through drowning accidents, and I can't tell you how many times people have thanked me for providing some source of guidance and solace. Publishers would do well to realize that this is truly an untapped market. And because disasters happen all the time, books guiding people through the aftermath and recovery would have solid shelf life, like books about death and dying.
In terms of reaching out to survivors in the aftermath of September 11th, the loss of more than 350 fire-rescue and law enforcement personnel hit me hard on a personal emotional level. I had met and interviewed members of NY-TF1, New York's multi-agency urban search and rescue (US&R) task force, which was absolutely decimated that day. Although I was not close to these guys in the way I've become close with many of the folks who serve on the California US&R teams, it felt like a death in the family.
But what really got to me was when television news cameras showed families and friends of those who were missing as they distributed printed flyers describing their loves ones and featuring photos of them. I'd had to do the same thing, handing out descriptions of Earl to agencies up and down the river, while awaiting news of his fate.
I started to wonder about all the young couples, like Earl and me, who were engaged, but not yet married. The week before his remains were finally recovered, nine months after he disappeared, Earl was presented with the Carnegie Medal of Honor for Heroes, posthumously, in honor of his heroic attempt to save the young boy. The medal was mailed to his parents and I was informed that widow's benefits were available only to those who were legally married. What this meant was that I had all of the responsibilities of being a legal widow and none of the "benefits." It was a tremendous financial blow on top of everything else, because Earl and I were typical of people in their 20s, totally unprepared financially to handle a sudden death.
For this reason, when the financial settlement for the families of 9/11 victims was announced, I vigorously advocated on behalf of couples who were engaged, who could clearly demonstrate their future plans together. I'm not sure how important sharing my story was at the time, but it boosted the effort to include engaged couples, as well as gay and lesbian couples, in the financial settlement process.
SCJ: What has it taken for you to heal from the pain of losing Earl?
NR: Healing is a gradual process that differs for everyone. In those early, bewildering days and nights following Earl's disappearance, I had no guidebook. Because I was not a "legal" widow, I could not participate in any local widow support groups. General grief support was inadequate due to the trauma and lack of resolution, with Earl's remains missing. My wise mother handed me a blank journal and encouraged me to chart my own course through this unknown territory. The ten "grief journals" that I filled over the next several years following Earl's death were truly a lifeline for me.
The words I scrawled on the page were like little fireflies lighting the path on my healing journey. Love was my invisible guide, as well as the fuel propelling me forward. Because I was a witness to Earl's death, traumatic stress exposure compounded what might have been a more normal grieving process. I felt compelled to remain in Los Angeles until Earl's remains were recovered, never imagining that this would take nine months. I felt compelled to speak out about the need to develop a swiftwater/flood-rescue program and educate people about the dangers of moving water, never imagining that this would become a 20-year-long effort.
In those early days it never felt like I had a choice to do this. I had to do this. I was compelled to take action by a force that was more powerful than any resistance or hesitation generated from within my own grieving heart.
I never imagined launching a rescue revolution, but that's what happened. Progress remains slow; too many swiftwater rescue programs continue to be built on the graves of victims who could, and should have been rescued if only local emergency responders had the proper training, equipment, and response planning to begin with. But playing a key role in this lifesaving effort has been the central moving force in my own healing process.
SCJ: What is the strongest life lesson you have drawn from losing Earl?
NR: When you lose a loved one suddenly and traumatically, the "why" questions can consume you. The trauma itself can become a defining force and sometimes you feel powerless standing in its shadow. The morning after Earl was swept away there was a knock on my door. I opened it and found my father and mother standing there. They had flown in from Colorado to give me support and assistance. It was a tremendous moment, knowing that I did not have to face the immediate aftermath alone.
After a teary reunion where, for the first time in my life, I saw my father cry, he asked to see where Earl disappeared. He needed to do reconnaissance, to see what we were up against. We walked to the footbridge spanning the river, which was still churning with runoff, like a flash flood in a box. As we stepped onto the levee, the cold truth hit me hard. The roiling water was a force beyond what anyone could survive and I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that I would never see Earl alive again. My knees buckled and Dad grabbed me as I shuddered and cried, "Why? Why did this have to happen? Why did Earl try to rescue a child from this kind of water? Why did he die, when the child survived?"
"When I was on Okinawa," my dad said quietly, "we were in a firefight that was like this river. Relentless. Unstoppable." Before this moment in time, Dad had never spoken of his experiences as a Marine in World War II. As I quietly sobbed while he held me tight, he added, "My buddy to the right took a bullet. The guy behind me dropped. Another guy next to me was hit. Three guys to my left were gunned down. When it was all over, I was one of the only guys left standing. Nancy, you may as well ask why I'm alive as why Earl's dead."
In that instant, the why questions dissipated forever.
But my father had wisdom beyond the why questions. He looked me in the eyes and said, "This may be a defining moment in your life, but it is not the defining moment. This tragedy is not who you are or who you will become. Like someone coming home from war, you now have some hard choices to make. Don't ever let this moment keep you from living the life you were born to live."
In the safe embrace of my family, I learned that love is more powerful than any force in the universe. It transcends time and space and reaches beyond Death's door. It is not the pain that matters. It is not the trauma or tragedy. It is how you choose to relate to it. If you cling to the truth and allow love to be your guide, no matter the pain, you will never go wrong.
I would encourage others who have endured traumatic experiences to be brave and write what is true and healing. You never know how your life story may inspire others who are struggling with similar issues to find the fortitude to move down a healing pathway instead of one that is self-destructive.
—Email interview conducted and edited by Jane Ross
About 'LifeWriters Talk About LifeWriting'
"LifeWriters Talk About LifeWriting" is a series of interviews with LifeWriters published in the Story Circle Journal. The Story Circle Network is a non-profit organization that honors women's voices, celebrates women's lives, and encourages women to tell their stories. To learn more about this unique organization, go to www.storycircle.org; to become a member, go to www.storycircle.org/frmjoinscn.shtml.
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Nancy Rigg: Her Story Helps Save Lives
(09/04, Vol. 8, Number 3)
In 1980, Nancy Rigg had recently moved to Los Angeles CA from Colorado with her tall, handsome fiancé, Earl Higgins. They were looking forward to marriage and to working together as writers and filmmakers. But unprecedented floods in February swept away her fiancé and her dreams and changed Nancy's life forever.
Torrential rains had been battering LA for several days, but finally the sky cleared and Nancy and Earl took their dog for a walk. As they crossed a high footbridge spanning the flood-swollen Los Angeles River, Earl and Nancy saw a 12-year-old boy jump into the roiling water to recover his bicycle, which had been caught by the powerful current and pulled in. In a moment the boy was being swept away. Earl ran to the edge of the river to try and save him, but, when he too stepped into the water, he was quickly swept downstream to his death. (Nancy vividly describes the events of that fateful day in her article in the February 2001 issue of the Story Circle Journal.)
Nancy has devoted the past 20 years to promoting swiftwater rescue safety throughout the US and to educating the public about the dangers of flood waters. Just this summer, the TV show "Tactical to Practical" on the History Channel featured a segment on swiftwater rescue and included an interview with Nancy.
At our February 2004 Story Circle Conference, Nancy was the facilitator for the panel on "The Power of Story." In this interview, Nancy talks about the different ways she has told her story and how she has used its emotional power to create change.
Story Circle Journal: In your account of the events surrounding Earl's death, you tell how you were suddenly faced with the question: "Who am I now that I am no longer 'Earl and Nancy'?" How were you able to answer this question?
Nancy Rigg: When you lose a spouse suddenly, whether it's due to death or divorce, there comes a point when you discover that you need to redefine yourself now that you are no longer a 'couple'. This is true even with the most loving and independent couples. For me, a piece of my heart disappeared with Earl down that river and the impact was profound on many levels, including my identity.
When you love someone deeply there is a subtle blending. You mesh on so many levels, that having that person torn away from you abruptly represents loss on many levels. I never realized until he was gone how much Earl and I had blended. Losing him meant losing an intrinsic connection to myself. For this reason it was a shock when I found myself staring at a stranger in the mirror after Earl died.
It took time for me to understand that with or without my partnership with Earl, I still had a lot of useful work to do during my time left on earth.
SCJ: In the months right after Earl's death, what was the usual reaction to your story and how did you deal with the reactions that you got?
NR: Because Earl and I had moved to Los Angeles only six weeks before he got killed, I did not have a wide group of friends or family living here who could lend support and quietly listen when I needed to talk. Although Hollywood routinely exploits tragedy, people in the film business aren't "allowed" to experience it themselves.
Earl and I had moved to LA to build careers in mainstream Hollywood film and television production, but we had not yet become established in our careers when he died. In fact neither of us had found a job yet. After Earl was swept away, I was determined to remain in the area until everything related to his death was resolved, including the recovery of his remains. Because this was a prolonged process that ended up taking nine months, I needed to keep myself afloat financially, so I had to get out and look for work. This proved difficult on many levels, not the least of which was that grief hovered over me like a huge, black cloud.
Being an "unmarried widow" also put me in an unusual position as I moved into the world again. I found that being a real-life tragic heroine is anything but welcome at film screenings, job interviews, and dinner parties. The common response in those early days was, "Oh, your boyfriend died? That is so sad, but you're young, you'll find someone new."
Rather than attempt to reason with people who were clearly clueless about matters of life and death, I eventually learned to bear my sorrow in silence. My journal became my lifeline, because part of the healing process involves expressing what happened, working through the grief, exploring the trauma, and charting a future course through life. Those first nine months after Earl disappeared and before his remains were finally recovered were the loneliest I've ever known in my life.
SCJ: Tell us how you began to tell your story in the media.
NR: The first time I wrote an article about Earl's death and its powerful lessons was when the first anniversary of his death was approaching in 1981. It was the rainy season again and a crushing sense of grief and concern was consuming me as torrential rainstorms slammed into LA again. I knew that other children and would-be rescuers were still at risk and, unless warnings were sounded, someone else was going to get killed. Compelled to speak out, I wrote an article begging parents to warn their children to avoid flood-swollen rivers and flood control channels.
I was so determined to be heard that I called the Los Angeles Times, got the name of the op-ed editor, and drove downtown to hand deliver my typed article to her! I'll never forget the astonished look on her face. But time was of the essence and I was determined not to have my story lost in the "unsolicited manuscript" pile. This article, called "A Valentine to One Who Cared," was published as a guest editorial on Valentine's Day 1981.
Because of the article, I was contacted by the LA County Lifeguards, who had been trying for years to implement an inland flood rescue program. It was through meeting with the lifeguards that I launched my quest to establish a comprehensive swiftwater and flood rescue program in LA, never realizing what a monumental and lengthy task it would be.
When we entered a seven-year-long period of drought, my efforts all but dried up. I focused on healing and moving ahead with my life but I always knew there would be another trip-wire that would re-open the issue of swiftwater rescue.
SCJ: How did your story help reopen public awareness of the need for swiftwater rescue?
NR: In 1992, as the 12th anniversary of Earl's death approached, the long seven years of drought ended with torrential flooding and a 15-year old boy named Adam Bischoff was swept down the Los Angeles River in a journey hauntingly similar to Earl's. This time, due to advances in technology, the haphazard, scrambled rescue attempt aired live on television, clearly showing that rescuers had no plan in place to deal with incidents like this. Emotionally shattered, I paged through my old grief journals and found the name of the county lifeguard who had contacted me ages ago and called him. He asked me, "Will you speak out; will you tell your story?"
The LA City Council was pressed into holding public hearings. This marked the first time I spoke out before a government body. I was later told that my personal testimony had an immediate, profound effect on political leaders and emergency responders alike. If these hearings had ended up being a one-shot deal to placate the community before things went back to the old status quo, the swiftwater rescue program would never have been developed. My testimony evidently helped propel the issue forward.
SCJ: You began being asked to do TV interviews.
NR: Yes. As a result of television and newspaper interviews coordinated by the LA County Lifeguards, I found myself serving as a spokesperson for the many families of victims who had lost their lives in swirling floodwaters. Adam Bischoff's family also contacted me and asked to join with me to create change. Together, we took on the LA City Council and County Board of Supervisors to raise awareness and secure funding for the pioneering LA County Multi-Agency Swiftwater Rescue Task Force, the first of its kind in the nation.
Drawing on my background as a writer and documentary filmmaker, I was asked to produce the first flood safety education video aimed at educating children about the dangers of fast moving floodwaters. This video, No Way Out, was distributed to schools throughout LA County and is still in use today.
SCJ: What opportunities and challenges did TV offer you?
NR: As I focused on ensuring that our new swiftwater rescue program survived budget cuts and other pressures that threatened to derail it during those first few years, the cable television industry "discovered" a new market that I call "rescuetainment," mining "exciting" television news footage and re-telling rescue stories. As a result, I found myself serving as the subject of several documentary TV programs focusing on flooding. I also co-produced a special for the Discovery Channel, which helped propel swiftwater and flood rescue onto the national stage.
I've always tried to remain open to opportunities to share my personal story in an effort to create awareness and change. But I've been very selective when choosing whom to work with and be interviewed by to avoid having Earl's last moments on earth be exploited for the sake of "rescuetainment" only. I've long been relieved that his death was not captured by news cameras back in 1980. It was bad enough to lose Earl once, but to have his death replayed again and again would have been tormenting.
SCJ: You've also told your story before Congress.
NR: That was in 2000. I was asked by a US Congressman to appear as a witness before a Congressional sub-committee that was studying why so many lives are lost in floods and what can be done to reduce the death toll. Standing before this committee in Washington, DC, one day before the 20th anniversary of Earl's death was like coming full circle.
I never intentionally set out to become a national spokesperson for flood safety education and swiftwater rescue. But someone needed to speak out for those whose voices were silenced too soon. Other families were unable or unwilling to step forward, so the task fell to me. I am proud to have allowed my personal story to be a transforming event that is now helping to save lives not just nationwide, but worldwide.
SCJ: How do print and visual media differ, in your experience?
NR: I love both the written word and the world of moving images. With words, you paint pictures that are powerful and compelling. You, and a good editor and publisher, are in charge of how the story will be presented. The process is relatively self-contained.
Unless you're a celebrity, with automatic name recognition, or you have the means to self-publish, it is a challenge in today's market to get a personal memoir published. I'm still working on this.
In documentary film and television production, the spoken word is important, but visual images really carry the story. The danger with television news footage is exploiting tragedies that belong to other families. As a writer, producer, and director, I have to approach this work very mindfully and carefully. Unfortunately, the entertainment industry is not known for its mindfulness, so creating meaningful, personal documentary projects is also a challenge.
Film and television production is also more collaborative than writing for the print media. Unless you're independently wealthy and can have the final say about how the program lays out, your work is subject not only to budgetary constraints, but also to opinions and input from every executive and filmmaker wannabe working up and down the production food chain.
Any meaningful creative project includes intrinsic challenges. When you make the leap from an idea to full production or publication, you simply have to be persistent and make choices based on your personal sense of integrity. As an artist, I believe in truth and simplicity. Regardless of whether it's a television or film documentary, a newspaper or magazine article, or a published book, I believe in letting the story tell itself. Keep it simple. By that I mean: you don't need to clutter up your documentary with fancy special effects or a thundering underscore or to twist what people say out of context to fit your preconceived notions. The same applies to articles and books. Keep it simple.
SCJ: Tell us about a time when your story had an immediate and profound effect on your listeners and changed their actions?
NR: I was asked to speak to a fire department that was in the process of developing a new swiftwater rescue program. The fire captain encouraged me to go into detail about how I was treated by on scene firefighters when Earl disappeared.
I quietly recounted how I was first yelled at by the firefighters who had to use bolt cutters to free me from the fenced-in area downstream where I had run along the levee, chasing after Earl and the boy, dragging my poor English Springer Spaniel behind me.
Then they totally ignored me while they joked and drank coffee leaning casually on their fire engine. They left me shivering with emotional shock and mild hypothermia in a downpour of rain, with no umbrella, jacket, blanket, or other protection, waiting for news of the rescue operations.
And when they finally called off the search and the fire engine pulled away, they left me standing alone by the river in a city I was totally unfamiliar with, stranded more than two miles downstream from where Earl entered the water, with no money, no keys to the apartment (our keys were in Earl's pocket) and no friend or family member to call for help.
About a week after recounting this story, the fire captain called and said, "You've ruined them! After listening to you talk, my guys have never been nicer. They can't do enough for the families of patients we transport to the hospital or when we go on a rescue call. They're taking too long to get the work done and they're driving me crazy!" We both had a good laugh over this.
To their credit, the majority of emergency responders in today's world are far more attuned to the needs of "secondary victims," including witnesses and family members, even as they make every effort to attend to the "primary victim," the actual person needing emergency care.
SCJ: You've talked about wanting to write your story as a way of promoting healing among survivors of disasters. And you were instrumental in advocating for fiancés of survivors of 9/11. Tell us more about this.
NR: There are virtually no personal memoirs about surviving natural disasters, let alone man-made ones like the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. I moderate online peer support groups for survivors of disasters and families who have lost loved ones through drowning accidents, and I can't tell you how many times people have thanked me for providing some source of guidance and solace. Publishers would do well to realize that this is truly an untapped market. And because disasters happen all the time, books guiding people through the aftermath and recovery would have solid shelf life, like books about death and dying.
In terms of reaching out to survivors in the aftermath of September 11th, the loss of more than 350 fire-rescue and law enforcement personnel hit me hard on a personal emotional level. I had met and interviewed members of NY-TF1, New York's multi-agency urban search and rescue (US&R) task force, which was absolutely decimated that day. Although I was not close to these guys in the way I've become close with many of the folks who serve on the California US&R teams, it felt like a death in the family.
But what really got to me was when television news cameras showed families and friends of those who were missing as they distributed printed flyers describing their loves ones and featuring photos of them. I'd had to do the same thing, handing out descriptions of Earl to agencies up and down the river, while awaiting news of his fate.
I started to wonder about all the young couples, like Earl and me, who were engaged, but not yet married. The week before his remains were finally recovered, nine months after he disappeared, Earl was presented with the Carnegie Medal of Honor for Heroes, posthumously, in honor of his heroic attempt to save the young boy. The medal was mailed to his parents and I was informed that widow's benefits were available only to those who were legally married. What this meant was that I had all of the responsibilities of being a legal widow and none of the "benefits." It was a tremendous financial blow on top of everything else, because Earl and I were typical of people in their 20s, totally unprepared financially to handle a sudden death.
For this reason, when the financial settlement for the families of 9/11 victims was announced, I vigorously advocated on behalf of couples who were engaged, who could clearly demonstrate their future plans together. I'm not sure how important sharing my story was at the time, but it boosted the effort to include engaged couples, as well as gay and lesbian couples, in the financial settlement process.
SCJ: What has it taken for you to heal from the pain of losing Earl?
NR: Healing is a gradual process that differs for everyone. In those early, bewildering days and nights following Earl's disappearance, I had no guidebook. Because I was not a "legal" widow, I could not participate in any local widow support groups. General grief support was inadequate due to the trauma and lack of resolution, with Earl's remains missing. My wise mother handed me a blank journal and encouraged me to chart my own course through this unknown territory. The ten "grief journals" that I filled over the next several years following Earl's death were truly a lifeline for me.
The words I scrawled on the page were like little fireflies lighting the path on my healing journey. Love was my invisible guide, as well as the fuel propelling me forward. Because I was a witness to Earl's death, traumatic stress exposure compounded what might have been a more normal grieving process. I felt compelled to remain in Los Angeles until Earl's remains were recovered, never imagining that this would take nine months. I felt compelled to speak out about the need to develop a swiftwater/flood-rescue program and educate people about the dangers of moving water, never imagining that this would become a 20-year-long effort.
In those early days it never felt like I had a choice to do this. I had to do this. I was compelled to take action by a force that was more powerful than any resistance or hesitation generated from within my own grieving heart.
I never imagined launching a rescue revolution, but that's what happened. Progress remains slow; too many swiftwater rescue programs continue to be built on the graves of victims who could, and should have been rescued if only local emergency responders had the proper training, equipment, and response planning to begin with. But playing a key role in this lifesaving effort has been the central moving force in my own healing process.
SCJ: What is the strongest life lesson you have drawn from losing Earl?
NR: When you lose a loved one suddenly and traumatically, the "why" questions can consume you. The trauma itself can become a defining force and sometimes you feel powerless standing in its shadow. The morning after Earl was swept away there was a knock on my door. I opened it and found my father and mother standing there. They had flown in from Colorado to give me support and assistance. It was a tremendous moment, knowing that I did not have to face the immediate aftermath alone.
After a teary reunion where, for the first time in my life, I saw my father cry, he asked to see where Earl disappeared. He needed to do reconnaissance, to see what we were up against. We walked to the footbridge spanning the river, which was still churning with runoff, like a flash flood in a box. As we stepped onto the levee, the cold truth hit me hard. The roiling water was a force beyond what anyone could survive and I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that I would never see Earl alive again. My knees buckled and Dad grabbed me as I shuddered and cried, "Why? Why did this have to happen? Why did Earl try to rescue a child from this kind of water? Why did he die, when the child survived?"
"When I was on Okinawa," my dad said quietly, "we were in a firefight that was like this river. Relentless. Unstoppable." Before this moment in time, Dad had never spoken of his experiences as a Marine in World War II. As I quietly sobbed while he held me tight, he added, "My buddy to the right took a bullet. The guy behind me dropped. Another guy next to me was hit. Three guys to my left were gunned down. When it was all over, I was one of the only guys left standing. Nancy, you may as well ask why I'm alive as why Earl's dead."
In that instant, the why questions dissipated forever.
But my father had wisdom beyond the why questions. He looked me in the eyes and said, "This may be a defining moment in your life, but it is not the defining moment. This tragedy is not who you are or who you will become. Like someone coming home from war, you now have some hard choices to make. Don't ever let this moment keep you from living the life you were born to live."
In the safe embrace of my family, I learned that love is more powerful than any force in the universe. It transcends time and space and reaches beyond Death's door. It is not the pain that matters. It is not the trauma or tragedy. It is how you choose to relate to it. If you cling to the truth and allow love to be your guide, no matter the pain, you will never go wrong.
I would encourage others who have endured traumatic experiences to be brave and write what is true and healing. You never know how your life story may inspire others who are struggling with similar issues to find the fortitude to move down a healing pathway instead of one that is self-destructive.
—Email interview conducted and edited by Jane Ross
About 'LifeWriters Talk About LifeWriting'
"LifeWriters Talk About LifeWriting" is a series of interviews with LifeWriters published in the Story Circle Journal. The Story Circle Network is a non-profit organization that honors women's voices, celebrates women's lives, and encourages women to tell their stories. To learn more about this unique organization, go to www.storycircle.org; to become a member, go to www.storycircle.org/frmjoinscn.shtml.
For information about the series or the Network, contact us via email:
storycircle@storycircle.org or phone: 512-454-9833 or write to:
Story Circle Network P.O. Box 500127 Austin, TX 78750-0127
Swiftwater Charity Competition
Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge
Nancy Rigg has been instrumental as a guiding force behind swiftwater rescue training and standards worldwide since a personal tragedy changed her destiny in 1980. Her fiancé, Earl Higgins was involved in the swiftwater rescue of a 12 year old boy in the flood-swollen Los Angeles River. Earl lost his life at the age of 29 during the rescue attempt in raging waters, while the young boy survived.
The 1980 floods in Los Angeles claimed over 30 lives. The deaths of at least 18 flood victims in raging rivers and streams, including Earl Higgins, were compounded by a lack of swiftwater rescue training and equipment for emergency responders. Nancy began to promote the concept of developing a multi-agency swiftwater and flood rescue program and increasing awareness through consistent and comprehensive flood safety education. Although there were dozens of additional flood deaths in the decade following Earl's death, Rigg's effort to promote change was stymied during many years of drought conditions.
In 1992, the drought in Los Angeles ended with torrential rains. The televised death of a 15-year old boy yet again demonstrated the need to implement a multi-agency swiftwater and flood rescue program and better educate the public, especially children, about the dangers of fast-moving floodwaters.
Nancy, a professional freelance writer and documentary filmmaker, played a key role in creating a pioneering flood safety education program, and published numerous articles on swiftwater and flood rescue in prestigious rescue magazines, including Advanced Rescue Technology Magazine. She also hosts two free online web newsgroups, the SwiftH20-News and the Drowning Support Network.
This year, Nancy was paid a great honor by the Higgins and Langley Memorial Awards Committee during the annual National Association for Search And Rescue (NASAR) conference in Reno, Nevada. In addition to receiving the 2003 Higgins and Langley Lifetime Achievement Award, Nancy was also presented with the SVC Distinguished Service Medal ~ only the second medal presented by this Canadian non-profit organization.
Nancy received these awards on behalf of her 23-year long, valiant efforts to educate, inform, and promote swiftwater and flood rescue training, response planning, and equipment development. Flooding is the leading cause of weather-related death worldwide. Even today, many public safety agencies lack adequate training and equipment to respond to lifesaving missions in floods.
During the NASAR awards presentation, the final surprise was the announcement of the first annual Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge! Proceeds will support the Higgins and Langely Memorial Awards.
Proceeds in future years will support the Higgins and Langely Memorial Awards.
Tax-deductible contributions to the Higgins and Langley Awards offer a special way to honor the lifesaving missions performed by rescue agencies all over the world!
Participation in the Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge supports camaraderie, teamwork and problem solving in a fun atmosphere and also celebrates the athleticism of professional water rescue personnel.
Higgins & Langley Awards Newsletter on Yahoo: A 501(c)3 non-profit designation.
http://higginsandlangley.org/profile.shtml
Nancy Rigg has been instrumental as a guiding force behind swiftwater rescue training and standards worldwide since a personal tragedy changed her destiny in 1980. Her fiancé, Earl Higgins was involved in the swiftwater rescue of a 12 year old boy in the flood-swollen Los Angeles River. Earl lost his life at the age of 29 during the rescue attempt in raging waters, while the young boy survived.
The 1980 floods in Los Angeles claimed over 30 lives. The deaths of at least 18 flood victims in raging rivers and streams, including Earl Higgins, were compounded by a lack of swiftwater rescue training and equipment for emergency responders. Nancy began to promote the concept of developing a multi-agency swiftwater and flood rescue program and increasing awareness through consistent and comprehensive flood safety education. Although there were dozens of additional flood deaths in the decade following Earl's death, Rigg's effort to promote change was stymied during many years of drought conditions.
In 1992, the drought in Los Angeles ended with torrential rains. The televised death of a 15-year old boy yet again demonstrated the need to implement a multi-agency swiftwater and flood rescue program and better educate the public, especially children, about the dangers of fast-moving floodwaters.
Nancy, a professional freelance writer and documentary filmmaker, played a key role in creating a pioneering flood safety education program, and published numerous articles on swiftwater and flood rescue in prestigious rescue magazines, including Advanced Rescue Technology Magazine. She also hosts two free online web newsgroups, the SwiftH20-News and the Drowning Support Network.
This year, Nancy was paid a great honor by the Higgins and Langley Memorial Awards Committee during the annual National Association for Search And Rescue (NASAR) conference in Reno, Nevada. In addition to receiving the 2003 Higgins and Langley Lifetime Achievement Award, Nancy was also presented with the SVC Distinguished Service Medal ~ only the second medal presented by this Canadian non-profit organization.
Nancy received these awards on behalf of her 23-year long, valiant efforts to educate, inform, and promote swiftwater and flood rescue training, response planning, and equipment development. Flooding is the leading cause of weather-related death worldwide. Even today, many public safety agencies lack adequate training and equipment to respond to lifesaving missions in floods.
During the NASAR awards presentation, the final surprise was the announcement of the first annual Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge! Proceeds will support the Higgins and Langely Memorial Awards.
Proceeds in future years will support the Higgins and Langely Memorial Awards.
Tax-deductible contributions to the Higgins and Langley Awards offer a special way to honor the lifesaving missions performed by rescue agencies all over the world!
Participation in the Rigg International Swiftwater Challenge supports camaraderie, teamwork and problem solving in a fun atmosphere and also celebrates the athleticism of professional water rescue personnel.
Higgins & Langley Awards Newsletter on Yahoo: A 501(c)3 non-profit designation.
http://higginsandlangley.org/profile.shtml
Nancy urges flood safety
Advocate urges flood safety
Back in 1980, freelance writer and filmmaker Nancy Rigg didn't expect the rest of her life to be consumed by an almost messianic mission to promote flood safety.
BY TRAVIS DUNN BALTIMORE August 27, 2003
Back in 1980, freelance writer and filmmaker Nancy Rigg didn't expect the rest of her life to be consumed by an almost messianic mission to promote flood safety.
Then again, Rigg also didn't anticipate the death that year of her fiance, 29-year-old Earl Higgins.
Higgins was one of dozens left dead by drowning in Los Angeles in 1980. In the midst of a torrential cloudburst, Higgins saw a child swallowed up by the river, and heedless of the risk, he dived in to make a desperate rescue attempt. He succeeded in saving the child – but only at the expense of his own life.
"Like many other good people, he gave his own life trying to save someone else," Rigg said. "Nearly half of deaths in floods are of would-be rescuers."
For Rigg, his death was devastating enough. But that initial sense of helplessness and frustration returns every time she reads about similar incidents. That's something she does every day. Rigg keeps a running tally of every drowning death in the United States. And this year, she said, has been particularly bad.
What has been so frustrating to her about many drowning incidents this year is how easily these deaths could have been prevented.
Perhaps the best example of this, she said, occurred in the Adirondacks this summer. Four teenage boys drowned in their favorite swimming hole, and they weren't even swimming.
Rigg said the boys were on a hike, when one of them fell in the flood-swollen creek where they liked to swim. The current was stronger than he was used to, and the other three boys tried to save him. All four of them died.
In another example, a woman in Pennsylvania died this summer when swimming in her favorite spot. But this happened to be just upstream from a low-head dam. "Some people call it a drowning machine," Rigg said.
When water levels were normal, the swimming hole was safe. But past flood stage, turbulence carried the woman close the dam, where she was sucked into the cyclic current created by the dam and was unable to escape.
"What's downstream – that's another thing that people aren't factoring in," she said.
Rigg insists that public education can be an effective antidote to unnecessary drowning deaths like these.
"I figure if we can't rescue people, then we have to educate them," she said. That's been a big part of her mission for the last 20-something years. She wrote, directed and produced "No Way Out," a video aimed at students in grades 4-12, and which has been used in classrooms nationwide, and particularly within the safety education curriculum of the Los Angeles County public schools.
Teaching kids not to attempt water rescues by themselves, as well as explaining to them the almost invisible power of floodwater, are two crucial components to water safety education, she said.
"Education works," she said, "but it has to be consistent and comprehensive."
But public education also needs to work in tandem with the training of disaster responders, who may not be aware of the specific dangers presented by swift-moving flood water.
"These two programs go hand in hand," she said.
Helping to improve communication between local agencies can be perhaps one of the most important steps in this educational process. For example, in 1980, when her fiance drowned, his body passed through 11 different flood jurisdictions. None of the officials from these separate jurisdictions were capable of effectively communicating with each other, not at the speed it would have taken to save his life.
Today in Los Angeles, the situation is quite different. The flood zones of the whole city are mapped out, and response is centrally coordinated. A person sucked into a flood channel in any part of the city can be tracked, and rescuers can be sent directly to where the person can be found.
"People are completely unaware of the power of flood water," she said. "Less than six inches of water can sweep you off your feet if it's going fast enough."
Rigg hopes that her life's work has made a difference. But she has her doubts when she takes notice of how government agencies and nonprofit groups collect statistics on drowning deaths.
Rigg thinks that most of these organizations low-ball the actual numbers. For example, she takes issue with the Centers for Disease Control's statistics, which show that an average of nine people drown every day in the United States. She notes that these numbers do not include boating-related deaths.
The perfect example of statistical incompetence, she said, first hit her in 1980, when she was told by an official for the state of California that there were no flood deaths in Los Angeles County for that year.
When the official told her that statistic, Rigg responded, "Well, I know of one flood death in 1980." But that wasn't the only mistake; Rigg had also counted about 20 other drowning deaths that year.
"To have his death written off as a statistic, and not even a very well calculated statistic, was extremely frustrating," she said. "So I don't believe the statistics at all. How are these statistics being tracked? It's really unfair to loved ones to not have their deaths being counted. It's about giving these hazards their due."
http://www.disasternews.net/news/article.php?articleid=2976
Back in 1980, freelance writer and filmmaker Nancy Rigg didn't expect the rest of her life to be consumed by an almost messianic mission to promote flood safety.
BY TRAVIS DUNN BALTIMORE August 27, 2003
Back in 1980, freelance writer and filmmaker Nancy Rigg didn't expect the rest of her life to be consumed by an almost messianic mission to promote flood safety.
Then again, Rigg also didn't anticipate the death that year of her fiance, 29-year-old Earl Higgins.
Higgins was one of dozens left dead by drowning in Los Angeles in 1980. In the midst of a torrential cloudburst, Higgins saw a child swallowed up by the river, and heedless of the risk, he dived in to make a desperate rescue attempt. He succeeded in saving the child – but only at the expense of his own life.
"Like many other good people, he gave his own life trying to save someone else," Rigg said. "Nearly half of deaths in floods are of would-be rescuers."
For Rigg, his death was devastating enough. But that initial sense of helplessness and frustration returns every time she reads about similar incidents. That's something she does every day. Rigg keeps a running tally of every drowning death in the United States. And this year, she said, has been particularly bad.
What has been so frustrating to her about many drowning incidents this year is how easily these deaths could have been prevented.
Perhaps the best example of this, she said, occurred in the Adirondacks this summer. Four teenage boys drowned in their favorite swimming hole, and they weren't even swimming.
Rigg said the boys were on a hike, when one of them fell in the flood-swollen creek where they liked to swim. The current was stronger than he was used to, and the other three boys tried to save him. All four of them died.
In another example, a woman in Pennsylvania died this summer when swimming in her favorite spot. But this happened to be just upstream from a low-head dam. "Some people call it a drowning machine," Rigg said.
When water levels were normal, the swimming hole was safe. But past flood stage, turbulence carried the woman close the dam, where she was sucked into the cyclic current created by the dam and was unable to escape.
"What's downstream – that's another thing that people aren't factoring in," she said.
Rigg insists that public education can be an effective antidote to unnecessary drowning deaths like these.
"I figure if we can't rescue people, then we have to educate them," she said. That's been a big part of her mission for the last 20-something years. She wrote, directed and produced "No Way Out," a video aimed at students in grades 4-12, and which has been used in classrooms nationwide, and particularly within the safety education curriculum of the Los Angeles County public schools.
Teaching kids not to attempt water rescues by themselves, as well as explaining to them the almost invisible power of floodwater, are two crucial components to water safety education, she said.
"Education works," she said, "but it has to be consistent and comprehensive."
But public education also needs to work in tandem with the training of disaster responders, who may not be aware of the specific dangers presented by swift-moving flood water.
"These two programs go hand in hand," she said.
Helping to improve communication between local agencies can be perhaps one of the most important steps in this educational process. For example, in 1980, when her fiance drowned, his body passed through 11 different flood jurisdictions. None of the officials from these separate jurisdictions were capable of effectively communicating with each other, not at the speed it would have taken to save his life.
Today in Los Angeles, the situation is quite different. The flood zones of the whole city are mapped out, and response is centrally coordinated. A person sucked into a flood channel in any part of the city can be tracked, and rescuers can be sent directly to where the person can be found.
"People are completely unaware of the power of flood water," she said. "Less than six inches of water can sweep you off your feet if it's going fast enough."
Rigg hopes that her life's work has made a difference. But she has her doubts when she takes notice of how government agencies and nonprofit groups collect statistics on drowning deaths.
Rigg thinks that most of these organizations low-ball the actual numbers. For example, she takes issue with the Centers for Disease Control's statistics, which show that an average of nine people drown every day in the United States. She notes that these numbers do not include boating-related deaths.
The perfect example of statistical incompetence, she said, first hit her in 1980, when she was told by an official for the state of California that there were no flood deaths in Los Angeles County for that year.
When the official told her that statistic, Rigg responded, "Well, I know of one flood death in 1980." But that wasn't the only mistake; Rigg had also counted about 20 other drowning deaths that year.
"To have his death written off as a statistic, and not even a very well calculated statistic, was extremely frustrating," she said. "So I don't believe the statistics at all. How are these statistics being tracked? It's really unfair to loved ones to not have their deaths being counted. It's about giving these hazards their due."
http://www.disasternews.net/news/article.php?articleid=2976
House of Representatives, Subcomittee on Oversight, Investigation adn Emergency Management
FLOOD WATER RESCUE
Wednesday, February 16, 2000
House of Representatives, Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations and Emergency Management, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Washington, D.C.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:07 p.m., in Room 2167, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tillie K. Fowler [chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Mrs. FOWLER. The subcommittee will come to order. We have got some votes that are scheduled again in about 15, 20 minutes, and those will go on for two votes. We thought we would go ahead and start the hearing and we will have to recess when we have those two votes and start back up. But in the interest of time, we wanted to go ahead and begin and we are waiting on two members, but I thought I would go ahead and give my opening statement. Today's hearing examines a proposal for augmenting the Federal Emergency Management Agency's existing Urban Search and Rescue Program to include water rescue expertise. Flooding is the single greatest recurring natural disaster in the United States causing nearly 100 deaths each year. Approximately 10 percent of these deaths are public safety personnel attempting water rescues. We hear statistics like this all the time, but these statistics are not just numbers. They are people like you or me who get trapped in an overwhelming situation. I can think of no better way to get this point across than to introduce you to one of these victims, Adam Bischoff. And if they would roll the tape. This is a tape about Adam. [Video tape played.]
Mrs. FOWLER. We lose 100 Adam Bischoffs every year to floods. Representatives Brian Bilbray and Connie Morella have put forward a proposal that I think will save lives. I will let them explain it, and we will hear from experts regarding their idea. But first I would like to recognize our ranking member, Mr. Traficant, for his opening statement. Page 10 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. TRAFICANT. I want to thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I see the bells are ringing. I want to first start off by saying that I didn't realize you were retiring after this term and would not be back with us. I want to say that that will be a loss to not only this Congress, but to the country, and we certainly are going to miss you.
Probably Congresswoman Morella and Congressman Bilbray did not come over because they heard there would be this vote. I will not belabor my statement. I reiterate the fact that we talk about a lot of exciting disasters. We hate disasters, but there are some that get a lot more headlines. Floods seem not to get the type of disastrous headlines as others, although there are more deaths and tragedies many times attached if we really would look into them.
But most of all, I want to comment a little bit about FEMA. I have, over the years, had some good relationships with FEMA. We had a tornado through our district. I think they worked hard and closely and together with me. But there is one troubling matter that I have about today's hearing. From my years of experience, I was under the impression that FEMA was to have promulgated and had set in place a plan similar to that which we are now discussing, deliberating, and in fact ultimately will be deciding upon. Evidently, Madam Chairwoman, FEMA has never developed that plan. That, to me, is troubling.
So I think the authority is there for the agency to act. I think they should have by now. And I noticed that two of our more effective Congressmembers are here, and I know that we have votes coming up, so I will ask unanimous consent that my entire written statement be spread across the record. Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Mr. Traficant. We do have a vote on, which I know the vote is on final passage so it only is one vote instead of the two we thought we would have. So I believe if it is all right we will recess briefly to go vote and then come back and start so we won't have to stop in the middle of your testimony. So the subcommittee is recessed for the vote. Thank you. Page 11 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
[Recess.] Mrs. FOWLER. The subcommittee will come back to order. Our ranking member had to leave. This was our last vote for the day so at least we will not have any more interruptions. We have a couple of other members that will be joining us.
I would like to call the witnesses for the first panel. We are honored to have two Members of Congress testify before the subcommittee today, the Honorable Brian Bilbray of California and the Honorable Connie Morella of Maryland. The standard procedure of this subcommittee is to swear in all witnesses, so please stand and raise your right hand. [Witnesses sworn.]TESTIMONY OF HON. BRIAN BILBRAY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM CALIFORNIA; AND HON. CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM MARYLAND
Mrs. FOWLER. We will first hear testimony from Mr. Bilbray and then Mrs. Morella. Brian Bilbray represents the 14th District of California. A native of California, Mr. Bilbray has been an advocate for his district and the San Diego area for more than 20 years. But Mr. Bilbray has been most well known for his hands-on approach to protecting his constituents. Notably, and of particular relevance to this hearing, in 1993, he helped rescue people and animals during heavy flooding along the Tijuana River Valley. So we are honored to have you with us today, and Mr. Bilbray you may proceed.
Mr. BILBRAY. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I guess old lifeguards can be called back into service once in a while. That is a difference between old lifeguards and old politicians. I want to first thank you for holding this hearing, and I want to thank the full committee, Chairman Bud Shuster for allowing us to participate today. I also want to give credit to the ranking member, Mr. Traficant, for his encouragement on this issue. He is a hands-on type of person that all of us relate to. And with his background in public safety, I think he understands the unique situation here and the challenge and the opportunity we have. Page 12 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
I would also think that we need to thank Nancy Rigg and Chris Brewster for flying across the country to be able to bring the message from California. And let me say, Madam Chair, as a former lifeguard of San Diego County beaches, I happened to have served as the disaster preparedness chairman for 2.8 million people of that county a few years later and after the flooding we had in the 1990's, where actually Chris Brewster called me and asked me to get involved because I not only had some lifeguard background, but I knew the specific area, the Tiajuana River Valley where we were rescuing drowning illegal aliens, resident citizens, and also horses and dogs and cats.
And so when we talk about this too we are not just talking about saving human lives. We also are talking about our animal friends out there and companions that we want to rescue. At the same time, I have seen how the system works. I have had the experience of being asked to come here and work with the San Diego Lifeguard Service at Cabin John to be able to do programs in the Potomac River at night. And let me assure you that the capabilities of local communities to be able to respond and aid in the Federal responsibility under FEMA is there today and ready. The big challenge is will Washington rise to the occasion of drawing on these resources and expanding them.
It is clear to me, as an ex-chairman of emergency services and ex-lifeguard, but mostly as a representative of the people today, that there are great opportunities that are being overlooked. When I watched the Mississippi River rise and recently when I watched the flooding in North Carolina with the firsthand knowledge I have, it is just frustrating to see that the resources are not made available to save the lives of human beings, to avoid the type of deaths that we saw, and also protecting the wildlife and the domestic stock. FEMA is the agency to do this. FEMA is the agency that should have the responsibility and continues to have this responsibility. Page 13 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
I would like to say to you quite sincerely, I appreciate my colleague from Maryland joining with me on this because I think it is an example that this is not a West Coast or East Coast, it is not a South Coast or North Coast issue. This is an American issue. That if lifeguards from the Potomac, lifeguards from San Diego can show up in the Ohio River and rescue lives, we not only have a right but a responsibility to do that.
And I want to assure you of one thing. This is not a program that you just take people off the shelf and have them go do river rescue. It is unique training not just from the training point of view, but the mentality of the personnel involved, just ask the SEAL team instructors. The first thing they do is tie people up and throw them in the water and see if they panic. Not everyone out there is qualified or should be asked to perform rescues. You do not put a rescue vest on somebody and make them a lifeguard or a river rescue person.
And I think that is very important from a public safety point of view. Probably less than 20 percent of our population is suitable for this type of work. At the same time, you don't expect a firefighter to show up in full turnout gear and get in and around a water environment. And as a lifeguard, I cringe at the threat to their safety doing that.
But I leave you with this issue. Spring is coming. We are already seeing the snow melt in the West, causing flooding in California. The question that is going to be brought before us as representatives of the people is why we haven't taken action now to prepare FEMA to make sure that when the waters rise this spring, that there are lifeguards and rescue people there to save lives. Because if we don't, you know that every life lost we will be blamed either indirectly for our lack of action. So I ask you to join with us in calling on FEMA and everyone involved in this issue nationally to be able to draw resources so when somebody needs to be rescued, that lifeguard is there to pull them out of that river. Thank you very much.
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Representative Bilbray. We will now hear from representative Morella. Mrs. Morella has represented the Eighth District of Maryland in Congress for 7 terms and serves as a very strong advocate for the constituents in her district. And one of her constituents is Steve Miller, who will be one of the witnesses on our second panel and who is co-author of the flood rescue proposal. So we are honored to have you with us today. Page 14 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you Madam Chair. I really want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for having this hearing. I appreciate you doing that. Again, Chairman Shuster, who also believes that this was a good idea, members of the subcommittee and the fact that we do have this hearing, it is very important.
I also want to commend my colleague, Brian Bilbray from California, who has done such a great job in spearheading this very important project. I also want to comment on the fact that not only will Steve Miller be here, Steve is as you mentioned, the Cabin John Fire Department chief. He is a constituent, comes with great credentials, has always been most concerned about saving people and what fire rescue is all about. He is a deputy chief of the Cabin John Fire Department. He is a team leader and the chief of water rescue for Montgomery County River Rescue and Tactical Service Team. That means he is responsible for all the Potomac and moving water rescue in Montgomery County. He has been with Montgomery county for 30 years. Additionally he has been a career firefighter for the District of Columbia for 25 years, working the past 6 years with the rescue boats in the D.C. Fire Department. So he has tremendous credentials for this particular plan.
And also the San Diego lifeguard lieutenant, Marshall Parks, will be testifying. They have developed a compelling proposal that will save many lives in types of floods. I also was very pleasantly surprised to have President King Jordan here who is the President of Gallaudet. It almost sounds redundant to say ''President King.'' that is kind of a double epithet. And also a woman who has taken a tragedy and works very hard to develop it into an action plan to help others. I appreciate her commitment.
Aside from fires, flooding is the most common and widespread natural disaster, claiming the lives of 100 people each year in America. Most communities are susceptible to this danger during spring rains, heavy thunderstorms, and as the snow melts during a winter thaw. Tragically, 1 percent of those who are killed each year are emergency personnel attempting to rescue without the adequate training or equipment. Page 15 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Unlike earthquakes, tornadoes or lightning strikes, flooding can be predicted. Last year, Hurricane Floyd was detected just off the Bahamas on a course likely to make an East Coast landfall. Moving at 14 miles per hour, Floyd left plenty of time for an accounting of flood response resources and an assessment of dangerous areas. A coordinated local and regional response could have been prepared. Colloquial alert teams should have been supplemented by resources from other localities in the region as the flooding continued in some areas. And as time elapsed, skilled rescue workers from across the country, acting on a Federal effort, could have provided relief and support for the overburdened local and regional personnel as the flood crested and subsided.
Unfortunately, no such plan was in place and while local response teams in North Carolina exhausted themselves over the week-long deluge, available resources in Maryland were never deployed.
Often, even within states, there is little coordination of flood response efforts. In June of 1996, heavy rains caused serious flooding in Frederick, Maryland, just north of my district. Rescue workers heroically struggled to assist flood victims but were overwhelmed by the elements. They simply lacked the skills and materials that were necessary for these situations. Fortunately, one volunteer firefighter knew that there were resources available in neighboring Montgomery County and took the initiative to call the Cabin John Fire Department for assistance. Having secured permission from the county governments, the flood response team was dispatched from my district to assist the people of Frederick.
Of the seven people rescued by the Cabin John team, three had been emergency personnel who had been put in danger attempting the rescue themselves. The bottom line, Madam Chair, FEMA needs to implement a plan to lay out the processes and procedures for responding to flood emergencies. Locally, emergency managers need to be educated to understand what conditions exist that may place their jurisdiction in danger of flood conditions at any time. Page 16 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
This information is already available from the U.S. Geological Survey. They need to understand what resources they have available and how to request further assistance when necessary. And at the State and regional level, there needs to be coordination so that resources can quickly be shifted to support areas of greater need, even across State borders.
Emergency personnel need to understand that there are people they can call when they are overwhelmed. And as flood conditions persist, there needs to be a plan for a Federal response to assist the continuing evacuation. And as the water subsides, the cleanup. The pieces by and large, are already in place. If there were a plan of action for a coordinated strategy of flood emergencies, the needless loss of life and property can be prevented.
I hope this subcommittee will move with that effort in mind. And I thank you, Madam Chair. Mrs. FOWLER. I thank you, Mrs. Morella. First before we go further, Mr. Terry, I would like to recognize the vice chairman of the subcommittee. Do you have anything? Thank you. I want to thank both the distinguished members for their testimony today and for their involvement in bringing this lifesaving proposal to our attention. I look forward to working with both of you in the future as we continue to examine this issue and move forward on it. Thank you so much for all of your work on it.
The Chair now calls the witnesses for the second panel. First, Nancy Rigg from Los Angeles, California. Mrs. Rigg is an author, documentary film producer, and flood safety education specialist. We will next hear from Deputy Chief Steve Miller from the Cabin John Park, Maryland, Volunteer Fire Department. Both of these witnesses are experts in the area of water rescue and water rescue education.
As with the first panel, we will swear in the witnesses, so if you would please stand and raise your right hand. Page 17 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
[Witnesses sworn.]TESTIMONY OF NANCY J. RIGG, FLOOD SAFETY EDUCATION SPECIALIST, LOS ANGELES, CA; AND STEPHEN F. MILLER, SR., DEPUTY FIRE/RESCUE CHIEF, CABIN JOHN PARK VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT, CABIN JOHN PARK, MD Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. We ask that you summarize your testimony in 5 minutes, and without objection your full written statements will be included in the record. Ms. Rigg if you would proceed first.
Ms. RIGG. Madam Chairwoman, members of the committee, my name is Nancy Rigg.
Tomorrow, February 17th, marks the 20th anniversary of the death of my fiance, Earl Higgins, who lost his life when he attempted to rescue a 12-year-old boy who slipped into the flood-swollen Los Angeles River. The child survived by some miracle, but Earl was swept 30 miles downstream past rescuers who had neither the training nor equipment to perform an effective swift water or flood rescue. Earl's remains were not recovered until 9 months later.
This unfortunate event, which ended Earl's life at age 29 and changed my life forever, may at first appear to be a local problem, something that has little to do with the Federal Government. The local emergency response capability was simply inadequate. But Earl died during a major flood, where more than 25 other lives were also lost, and the event became a federally declared disaster. And this deadly scenario has repeated itself time and again, flood after flood after flood over the years. This is not just a local, State, or regional problem. This is a national tragedy.
Flooding is the leading cause of weather-related death nationwide. Deadly floods strike all regions of this country with a force that is unimaginable, killing hundreds of people every year and leaving emotional scars on survivors that can last a live time. You would think that with the specter of this kind of disaster hovering over every watershed in the United States, disaster managers, rescue agencies, and educators would be clamoring to prepare. But the prevailing attitude is, floods? We don't have that problem here. Page 18 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Earl died in 1980, and despite scores of additional flood deaths, it took another 12 years before Los Angeles finally created the comprehensive multiagency swift water rescue program and public education programs that are now routinely saving lives and setting new standards of preparedness worldwide.
Those of us whose loved ones died before the swift water rescue teams were created may feel a sense of proud legacy, but the cost to us has been tremendous. How many families are now in mourning as a result of the floods from hurricane Floyd, which killed nearly 100 people, 51 in North Carolina alone? That storm sat off the East Coast for a week waving its huge red flag, 'I'm coming, get ready, get your flood rescue teams in place.' How is it then that everybody except the national weather service was caught by surprise when floods of biblical proportions were unleashed? The response was a discombobulated, reactive scramble by untrained rescuers and National Guard troops to 'do something,' instead of a proactive, precision strike, with highly skilled Federal, State, and local swift-water and flood rescue teams prepositioned, working together, and ready to go.
Hundreds of 911 calls went unanswered for 8 to 10 hours because no one was available to come help. Congressmembers Brian Bilbray and Constance Morella are the first national leaders to bring this tragedy into the public forum, and I wholeheartedly support their flood rescue team proposal. We need the kind of commitment for national flood preparedness that we have for terrorism preparedness, where Federal officials work with the states and local communities and they say, 'We don't want to hear that you have never had terrorist incidents here, so you don't need this training.'
A federally sponsored network of flood rescue teams could do more than save lives during major disasters. With their knowledge and expertise, they could work with states and local communities as Federal ambassadors of flood preparedness, where they could say, 'We have got to do something, it's not a matter of if, it is a matter of when you are going to get a major flood. You need to have a plan; you need to educate the public. Your rescue teams need flood rescue training and equipment, and your disaster managers need to know how to oversee a dynamic event where lives will be lost in an instant if you are not on top of things. We will provide you with our assistance now, as well as during a major disaster. Let's work together on this.' Page 19 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
The flood rescue team proposal should be implemented immediately. All it takes is leadership, organization, and a commitment to save lives. Please, support this proposal and take action now, because if you don't, flood rescue programs will continue to be built on the graves of people who could and should have been rescued. I admire what FEMA is doing in general, but why are we spending all of this time and effort and money on saving property and nothing on saving lives? Thank you.
Mrs. FOWLER. Chief Miller, you may proceed. Thank you.
Mr. MILLER. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Every year flooding occurs in different areas of the United States. The cost in human life is high, up to 200 persons per year.
Mrs. FOWLER. Could you pull the mike a little closer? Mr. MILLER. Many of these floods are due to the heavy rains that accompany hurricanes. Most of these floods develop over a period of several days to a week. All floods have three stages: fast-rising water, cresting moving water, and receding water. Many rescues are made during the fast-rising stage. People become trapped in or near their automobiles attempting to drive through the high water. Persons who reside near waterways may be trapped in their homes as the foundations are weakened by strong currents and washed away.
This is perhaps the most critical stage of a flood. Most of the high-profile rescues are made at this time, and there is a great risk factor for rescuers. The United States Fire Administration has stated that a firefighter is four times—four times more likely to lose his or her life attempting a swift-water rescue than in an actual working structure fire.
During the cresting moving water stage, the majority of rescues or evacuations are made by rescue boats. These boats proceed through towns and neighborhoods removing people from the roof tops or other high points. It should be noted that during this stage the situation may rapidly deteriorate again, due to levee or dam failures or other natural causes. With almost no warning, the rescuers and evacuees may be confronted with fast moving water again. Page 20 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
In the final stages of a flood, the waters recede and the danger from hazardous and toxic materials is high. Dead livestock, fertilizers and other waste must be dealt with. The rescuers will begin to leave the area in favor of the cleanup crews and hazardous materials experts.
At this time there is no national coordination of personnel trained in flood rescue. Most flood rescues are currently attempted by local rescue groups and military helicopters with little or no training in flood response. These resources are rapidly overwhelmed and seldom predeployed. Often, trained swift water teams are not dispatched until after the fact. Regional coordination is almost nonexistent. During the most current major flooding as a result of Hurricane Floyd, many trained rescue teams within a reasonable response time sat idle while untrained Federal groups were sent to the flooded areas with little or no training and no water rescue equipment. The exception was a task force from Pennsylvania. This task force had received formal swift water rescue training, not as part of their USAR training program, and they brought their own water rescue equipment. They were successful in rescuing over 30 people.
Advocates for a change believe that with the Federal Government assistance, many lives could be saved annually. This assistance could come in three ways: public education, support for the development, training and equipping of local and regional flood rescue teams, and by enhancing the equipment and training of some of the current USAR teams.
Public education could be accomplished in the drivers education programs, with public service announcements, and by the development of a national education program similar to that developed by Nancy Rigg, which is currently in use in California.
Development of flood/swift-water rescue resources: it is felt that the most effective way to address this problem is to develop properly trained and equipped flood/swift-water rescue teams at local, state and national levels. How this would be accomplished is currently subject to a great deal of debate in the flood/swift-water rescue community. But regardless of how this is achieved, once it is in place, it must be effective, efficient, and properly managed. These resources must be deployed in a proactive, rather than a reactive, manner. Page 21 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
These teams must be highly motivated, well equipped and well trained. They will be asked to perform their mission in a dangerous and dynamic environment, entering flood-swollen creeks and rivers to effect contact rescues as well as operating boats for rescue and evacuation purposes. Careful thought should be given to the location of the state and national teams, for their training must be constant and in the environment in which they will operate.
Three and four day classes with yearly re-certs, while necessary, are quite frankly insufficient. These teams will, out of necessity, need to spend a great deal of their time in training in addition to their normal duties. It would be a disservice to both the rescuers and the public to select groups that are unable to devote the great amount of time necessary to enable them to function effectively and safely in this environment.
In conclusion, I firmly believe that most of the pieces of this puzzle are on the table. However, they need to be organized and joined together in order to resolve this national problem. Persons with the expertise to accomplish this task are readily available and more than willing to work with whatever agencies are assigned the task of mitigating this problem. I would like to thank Lieutenant Marshall Parks, who unfortunately could not be here with us today, of the San Diego Lifeguard Service. He was instrumental in helping to put this together. And the Honorable Congresswoman Morella and Congressman Bilbray, the members of this committee, and the entire swift-water rescue community for their assistance and guidance in this effort.
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Chief Miller. I want to thank both of you for your testimony, and I have a few questions and I think Mr. Terry might have some also.
Ms. Rigg, as we know and I have been reading so much of this background, you were so instrumental in the development of California's water rescue response system, and as your testimony stated, it is important that this type of system go nationwide. Having heard the description of the proposal described by Chief Miller, what effect do you think that would have on the ability of local governments to respond to these flood disasters? Page 22 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Ms. RIGG. I think that the most important thing is that the training and the planning be federally guided but also coordinated through the States and the local governments.
The first responders are going to be the ones more than likely who are first on scene. Those are the local teams. In many cases like in North Carolina, these are volunteer search and rescue teams who lack the means or the support to gear themselves up and get basic flood awareness training, so they know how to protect themselves. So the California system that we have now involves the eight task force teams that are deployed through the Office of Emergency Services and FEMA. We have added swift water rescue components to those so you have eight federally supported and state supported teams who then work with the local teams which get pretty well overwhelmed in the early stages when they are working 36 hours straight.
So I think it is a great model. We are still improving upon it to get people in place in time. There's this structure of Federal reaction as opposed to preparation. And that is what has got to be worked on. Because if you're going to do life saving, you've got to be there, and that is the biggest barrier to overcome, not come in after the fact.
Mrs. FOWLER. You have set up my next question. That is great. One of the questions that has been raised is, how would your proposal, Chief Miller, address concerns that a Federal water rescue team would be unable to promptly respond to most flooding?
Mr. MILLER. The team must be proactive, as I stated. They must be on the move just before the event occurs. And they will be utilized, there is no doubt, after a major flood. The initial team is always overwhelmed. There is always too much work for them and the time period that they must operate in is several days to a week, and we have to remember that those local rescue teams have the worry, the added burden of the fact that it's their neighborhood, their town. They are trying to get their lives back in shape too.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, how would, under your proposal, how would the Federal response to Hurricane Floyd have been different, and could more lives have been saved if this proposal had been in effect? Page 23 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. MILLER. As Nancy put it, if you are going to save a life in a water rescue situation, in any water rescue situation, you have to be there to do it. You can't come in after the fact. If a plan would have been in place to coordinate the local groups to support them with the Federal teams, I think we could have saved quite a few lives in the state.
Mrs. FOWLER. And Ms. Rigg, I know in California you have the State office of Emergency Services Swift Water Rescue Advisory Committee. How effective has that been, and in your opinion would that type of advisory committee serve as a good role model for FEMA's efforts?
Ms. RIGG. Absolutely. I think it would be an excellent role model. Because what they have done is broken it down into working groups. Like the helicopter rescue group, so you get all the helicopter pilots trained; the ground based; the boat based. Everybody is working together. You have got multi-agency, law enforcement, firefighters and lifeguards all working together equally in this working group. They meet frequently. They have been developing standards. Hello. They have been developing the whole protocol of response.
That model could almost just be—if it could be replicated like a virus and spread nationwide—we'd be saving lives and I think floods would become the last cause of death in weather-related incidents. But it's an excellent program. As I said, it is still in development; but it is a great place to start rather than reinventing the wheel. Mrs. FOWLER. I want to ask Mr. Lee Terry from Nebraska, the vice chairman of the committee, any questions that you might have.
Mr. TERRY. Well, I do. First of all, we do have flooding in Nebraska. It's not just a coastal thing as Brian had mentioned. Ours fall into two categories. Every spring with the melt, of which now we are gripped in a drought, so this year we don't have to deal with it, but that is predictable. Part of the education every spring about the end of February, all the news stations start running about how when the flood waters start coming over the road, don't drive into it. Page 24 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
So I am curious what your research has shown about the number of the deaths that occur in this type of flooding is caused by—boy, I don't want to belittle anybody but people's ignorance. You know, you see a street then you see water over the street, you don't drive through it. That type of lack of education and boldness as opposed to other types. Whenever I see news clippings, it's usually somebody in a car that was foolish. So what is the role of education in this? And let's go with Ms. Rigg on this since that has been part of your fight.
Ms. RIGG. I think the role of education is critical. Especially if you don't have anybody there to rescue anybody. At least tell people, you know, let them know that if they get caught in flood waters that they are going to be on their own. But more to the point, Chief Miller was suggesting that this be integrated into drivers education. I grew up in Colorado, and one of the first things we learned was if the street was moving, don't go into it. I think something like 80 percent of all deaths in swift water are automobile-related.
Mr. TERRY. I didn't know it was that high. Ms. RIGG. Many people drive right around the barriers into the wash and get swept away. I think education is extremely important. But again we need Federal leadership to get this message out. I have from my studies, the program that I developed in California, we are one of the only States dealing with swift water, period. In any form. And we need more effort nationwide to educate everybody, not just people in California. So I think it is a critical area to be—to be included.
Mr. TERRY. The second type of flooding that occurs happened in my hometown this last August relying on—the weather folks predicted some heavy rains and did not predict a 10-inch rain in a matter of about 3 hours, which of course streams that were 1 foot deep became overwhelming and a couple of people did lose their lives, mostly because homes were close. Page 25 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
But nonetheless that is an occurrence where it was unpredicted. And it seems to me that type of situation, what we need to do is better train our first responders, our fire department. And you say that you have a model that has been developed in California, and Brian has referenced that to me when we were on the floor voting about half an hour ago. But what would you suggest, Mr. Miller and Ms. Rigg? But how do we take that to the Omaha, Nebraska, city government and fire department to implement this? Even though it's fairly rare, it occurs in Omaha, Nebraska, every few years.
Ms. RIGG. May I start?
Mr. MILLER. Absolutely.
Ms. RIGG. All fire departments train to fight high-rise fires, but high-rise fires may happen once in a decade. It doesn't mean they don't train regularly to handle high-rise fires. All airports that have a certain level of commercial traffic have an airport crash team that is always ready. I think flooding happens, on average, in every community more frequently than any one airport gets a plane crash, and yet there is this ever-ready state of readiness. So to me it is a matter of getting the issue of flood rescue to register on the radar. Period. We need firefighters to realize that this is for their own safety. As you know, 10 percent get killed every year in water-related incidents and four out of five deaths in technical rescues are water-related. So in that sense, the Omaha Fire Department, if it doesn't have a swift-water rescue team, would be well to get themselves up to the current standard.
And Chief Miller, you probably have a few things to add too.
Mr. MILLER. I believe that the best way to get that message out as far as the fire service is concerned, the managers of the fire departments have to be educated themselves. Many of them just don't want to recognize this as a problem. Perhaps programs through the National Fire Academy, United States Fire Administration would be helpful in this area. Page 26 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
It should be part of every firefighter's training. Every firefighter should be trained at least to an awareness level that we have a situation here and if we are not capable of handling it, we know exactly who to call and how to get them there. Mr. TERRY. You raise a good point. Let me follow up on that. We send a lot of our firefighters for training—in fact I have got a group of my Omaha firefighters that are going to be out here in training facilities next week or the week after. As part of this model, would you suggest that we identify maybe the San Diego lifeguards or your organization that we would identify swift water as a need for training and send them to you? Does this already exist?
Mr. MILLER. Well, actually we do joint training with the lifeguard river rescue team now. That is a one-to-one thing.
Certainly, we would be more than willing to train other groups. But it's going to be at a great expense to the people of Nebraska. Their programs should be developed at their State level, depending on the State. I am not very familiar with your system; all training might come under the office of the fire marshall, and he could dictate that they are required to have this training.
Different jurisdictions do it in different ways. Right now the University of Maryland MFRI has just become heavily involved in training swift water responders. So it could be done at the state level.
Ms. RIGG. May I add one thing? It's not just firefighters who need the training. Anyone who is working in a flood, whether it is a utility worker, a Department of Transportation worker, a police officer, they need the basic training to keep themselves from getting killed. In North Carolina, two Department of Transportation workers were killed when they were out working in the floods. So somebody needs to say—somebody needs to wake this country up and say, hello, water is killing people. That's really what it gets down to. Everybody would prefer to go to sleep on this issue until it happens to them and until it's their loved one. That's what I am begging you guys to do is say wake up and see what is actually killing people in this country every year. We've got to do something about this. Page 27 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. TERRY. It is important. I am curious, Mr. Miller, what type of equipment—. Mr. MILLER. Sorry sir? Mr. TERRY. What type of equipment is necessary if I am going to focus on how do we get the first responders prepared, police and fire coordinated, what kind of equipment—my friend Mr. Bilbray from California had given me this vision of our firemen and their heavy fighting gear out trying to rescue someone in the water. So what would you suggest as equipment?
Mr. MILLER. There are national standards out there, standards of the industry for the types of PFDs, personal flotation devices, life jackets, wet suits for the lifeguards, dry suits. One of the problems in a flooding situation is you've got all this stuff in the water that doesn't really belong there, and you are being exposed to it. It's very hazardous to your health. In that situation, dry suits, helmets. The type of rescue ropes that you use, line throwing devices. All of this. It's not a real secret. The information's out there. The fire department managers or emergency managers of all types must be encouraged to make sure that their personnel receive this education. And where to get the equipment is not hard. That can be pointed out to them readily.
Mr. TERRY. We do a lot of training. Our fire department does a lot of training in the lake rescues. How is swift water different from lake or muddy flowing river?
Mr. MILLER. They are both wet and that's about the similarity.
Mr. TERRY. I will give you that one.
Mr. MILLER. Just a couple of inches of moving water, if it is moving fast enough, will knock you off your feet. It is a very dynamic environment and it changes constantly. It takes a great deal of expertise to learn how to operate a rescue boat in moving water as opposed to just getting in a boat and driving down a flat lake. Certainly if that's the area that your people are detecting, they do need to know how to effect those types of rescues. But a swift water rescue is entirely different. The level of expertise is much, much higher. Page 28 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
San Diego lifeguard team, speaking with Marshall 2 years ago, and he was speaking with some of the emergency managers in Montgomery County. Marshall's team does cliff rescues, dive rescue, a very wide array of different types of rescues as well as surf rescues. And he stated in his personal opinion the most dangerous thing they train for is a swift water rescue.
Mr. TERRY. Thank you. I appreciate you being here.
Mrs. FOWLER. I just have a couple of other questions. Ms. Rigg, as you have examined flood and rescue readiness across the country, could you tell us approximately how many water rescue teams with formal training are there in this country?
Ms. RIGG. From my experience just communicating with a variety of teams nationwide, I can't give you, you know, a number like there's 2,000 rescuers or 20,000 rescuers. All I can say—what I can tell you more is that there aren't enough. California is coming around. Arizona has a pretty good program. Nevada has a pretty good program. Texas has a pretty good program. In North Carolina there are a lot of teams, but they were not in the eastern part of the state. They were all in the western part of the State.
More to the point it is a haphazard mishmash and not all of the teams are trained to the same level. You can have Firefighter Bob and his bass boat consider himself a rescue team for swift water, you know. So in terms—in terms of actually identifying resources, one of the things that needs to be done is to set the standard and identify who fits that pattern, because right now one of the problems is that the standard is so flexible and so amorphous that you don't necessarily have—I couldn't say that Omaha has a great swift water rescue program. In fact, I would doubt that they do. My dad was born in Omaha, so I like Omaha. But what I'm saying is that it is a mind-set that is missing, not just rescue teams. You have clusters in the West and clusters in the East and then some in the Midwest, a little bit here and there. But it is a mishmash. I'm sorry I can't be more specific. Page 29 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. No, but that helps us to see, because I think that is one of the problems that we need to be aware of. Chief Miller, we heard that a number of first responder rescuers die each year attempting water rescues. Are there any characteristics which cut across all of these tragedies as far as those that die, the rescuers?
Mr. MILLER. Two, actually. A lack of understanding of moving water and a lack of training to deal with that. As a firefighter for 30 years, the firefighter's mentality is that they called us, we are here and we are going to do something. It might not be the right thing to do, but we are going to do something. We are not going to stand here and have the press film us doing nothing. And that's what is killing rescuers.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, if adopted, would your proposal solve the problems that you and Ms. Rigg have identified today if we were able to get this moving?
Mr. MILLER. If adopted on a national basis? Obviously we are not going to save every life. But I think you would see a tremendous reduction in the number of lives lost in the United States.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, as a Member from Florida, we are very familiar in Florida with the problems from hurricanes and other floodings. We have a river that runs right through my city which, depending on the rains, if it is flooded or not. And I want to thank both of you for your bringing this to our attention and helping us to elevate it to national attention because that is what it takes to get movement on these things is to have people like yourself who spent so long working on this to help us educate people on the national level as to what the problem is and that there are solutions within reach of that.
And, Ms. Rigg, I think the work you have done for the past 20 years and the lives that you have saved are the most meaningful memorial that Earl could ever have. So thank you for all that you have done. We appreciate it. Thank you both. Page 30 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Ms. RIGG. Thank you. Mrs. FOWLER. The Chair would now call the witness for the third panel, Mr. Bruce Baughman. Mr. Baughman is from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. He holds the position of director, operations and planning division in the response and recovery directorate. Mr. Baughman as you know it is the standard procedure of this subcommittee to swear in all witnesses. If you would stand and raise your right hand.
[Witness sworn.]TESTIMONY OF BRUCE P. BAUGHMAN, DIRECTOR, OPERATIONS AND PLANNING DIVISION, RESPONSE AND RECOVERY DIRECTORATE, FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. Please be seated.
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the subcommittee. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before the subcommittee to discuss swift water rescue preparedness and response.
As has been stated before, a large percentage of the Nation's disasters are floods. The loss in such disasters has been considerable. In 1999 alone, 68 lives were lost to floods. Since 1990, fatalities have averaged 99 per year. Clearly there is a need to reduce loss of life from floods.
Again, as has already been stated, response to most flood rescue situations is handled by State and local governments which are generally well suited to respond rapidly for calls for assistance. However, flash flooding, which occurs with little or no warning, is among the most deadly and devastating of floods. Such states as California, Maryland, Texas and a number of communities have developed highly trained and well-equipped water rescue teams. Page 31 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
In order to make the most efficient and cost-effective use of rescue resources, FEMA believes primary reliance should be placed on existing intrastate and interstate mutual aid mechanisms rather than developing a new capability at the Federal level. One of the most promising interstate mutual aid mechanisms is an Emergency Management Assistance Compact, or EMAC. Membership in EMAC provides states with access to more resources and increases their ability to respond to major disasters and emergencies quicker. To date, 29 States have adopted EMAC.
However, the Nation is in need of a uniform standard for swift water rescue resources which would provide State and local emergency management officials with the assurance that responding units meet some minimum level of capability. And I think that this was stated already by Congressman Bilbray that it takes specialized training in swift water rescue.
Following Hurricane Floyd, at least seven EMAC states offered swift water assistance to North Carolina. Unfortunately, the State didn't know what to expect in terms of the resources being offered or their expertise in swift water rescue. The State of California has developed a draft-typing scheme that conforms to the incident command system standard. The scheme identifies capabilities, numbers of personnel, and transportation assets for each type of resource. This typing scheme should be adopted at the national level.
We believe that the National Emergency Management Association, or NEMA, as the implementer of EMAC could be an appropriate organization to coordinate this task. NEMA, which is made up of the Nation's state emergency management directors, and serves as a repository for other interstate mutual aid agreements, can also facilitate assistance to non-EMAC states during disasters. A number of individuals have advocated the creation of a national system of swift water rescue resources modeled after FEMA's National Urban Search and Rescue Response System. The swift water community appears to be divided about the appropriate model for this national system.
Our view is that the best use of the urban search and rescue model is to supplement State and local resources, not to replace them. FEMA could supplement State and local mutual aid efforts by deploying swift water rescue teams from within the departments that sponsor our existing Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces. With minimal additional resources, FEMA could use existing mechanisms to activate such teams when needed to supplement EMAC or other mutual aid resources or to provide resources when mutual aid resources are not available. Page 32 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
A number of departments participating in the Urban Search and Rescue Program have built swift water capabilities. The State of California has developed a water rescue component within each of its eight Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces.
Our goal would be to assess the existing capabilities within those departments that participate in our program that meet that typing standard. This approach would require only modest support to assess compliance with the adopted standards and to amend our current regulations and agreements to accommodate this new mission.
Development of any national program should take full advantage of existing rescue capability. In developing the Urban Search and Rescue Program, FEMA has expended over $21 million in Federal funds. The time to build a new system would be significant. We think that relying on existing mechanisms to the greatest extent possible would reduce both time required to save lives and the cost in responding.
In summary, the most significant improvement in the Nation's swift water rescue posture and corresponding decrease in number of lives lost could be accomplished through the following measures: .
First, that a consensus national standard for swift water rescue resources be adopted by an organization such as NEMA by exploring what already exists, such as the California model.
Second, that State and local governments maximize use of EMAC or other mutual aid agreements to supplement their existing water rescue capabilities.
And third, that FEMA assess existing water rescue capability within the departments that participate in its Urban Search and Rescue response system and make necessary policy, procedural and regulatory adjustments to enable those resources to supplement State and local government efforts. Before I conclude, Madam Chairman, I would like to, on behalf of Director Witt, thank you for your support for the mitigation program and for your work on the proposed changes to the Stafford Act. This concludes my comments. Page 33 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Mr. Baughman. I have a few questions, and I think Mr. Terry had to leave. Well, I understand that the President's budget request for fiscal year 2001 includes $3.825 million in antiterrorism funding to expand the urban search and rescue teams, but does not include any funding for flood rescue expertise. Is that correct?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. That is correct. That comes through—the counterterrorism appropriation that is directed primarily to outfit six of our existing task forces so that they are ready to respond to a weapon of mass destruction event.
Mrs. FOWLER. Since their inception, how many times has FEMA deployed the urban search and rescue teams?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. I think approximately 17 or 18 times we have deployed them.
Mrs. FOWLER. Is that average? Per year? How often?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. An average of about three times per year.
Mrs. FOWLER. Are they deployed solely for collapsed buildings?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. They are designed for collapsed structural buildings. We do predeploy and are proactive, contrary to popular belief. Sometimes, prior to a hurricane, FEMA does predeploy two Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces, several disaster medical units, and a number of other resources, teams, and commodities so that they are prestaged in potentially affected states.
In the past, the primary need on the part of State and local government for rescue resources has been for collapsed structures, not for water rescue. Very seldom, other than in North Carolina this year, have we been asked for that type of resource.
Mrs. FOWLER. So California hadn't asked you before?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. No, they have not. During the last floods in California, we did in fact use our system to deploy some resources to supplement their overhead capability in that particular disaster. Page 34 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. I would like to refer you to an enlarged exhibit over here. This is a copy of a letter that was sent by Director Witt to Nancy Rigg that was dated October 26, 1993. And I would like to enter the copy of the letter in the record. [The information follows:] [insert here]
Mrs. FOWLER. And a portion of that letter—and I believe you have seen this—reads as follows, and I quote: ''I support swift water rescue and flood safety education and will instruct my staff to identify ways that FEMA may become involved in encouraging such education programs and disseminating education materials.''.
Mr. Baughman, to your knowledge was this directive ever made; and if so, what was done to implement it?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. To my knowledge, no, it has not. I think certainly Director Witt would agree. I think that unfortunately, with time and other pressing matters we have not had the ability to follow through, and I think that this has raised the need to do that.
Mrs. FOWLER. So in your opinion then, you think FEMA will keep the commitment that was made in 1993?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Yes.
Mrs. FOWLER. But no request for funding for this type of commitment was made for the fiscal 2001 budget; is that correct?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. That's correct. Again, the most appropriate place within FEMA for this type of awareness would probably be the U.S. Fire Administration, and you know, we have a new Administrator. We also have a new Chief Operating Officer. I think once we have raised this to their level, we can accomplish it through there. Page 35 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
For what I have proposed, it will take some additional resources to accomplish.
Mrs. FOWLER. Returning back to your testimony, if as you propose FEMA makes the necessary procedure and regulatory adjustments to be able to provide water rescue resources as needed, would FEMA adopt its own standards or would it adopt the NEMA State standards?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. There is an NFPA standard 1670 that has been proposed. I think it needs work. I think what we would propose to do is set criteria for all our teams, based upon the California typing. I think it should be up to our U.S. Fire Administration working with the NFPA to come up with a nationwide standard, and we certainly would support that nationwide standard. Then you could use that to train personnel and equip water rescue units.
Mrs. FOWLER. If you would adopt whatever standards that NEMA would develop, then that would make your implementation time line dependent on their actions. So what measure would FEMA take to ensure a prompt development and implementation of standards?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Here is what we would do and we discussed this earlier. It would take us probably 60 to 90 day to develop some draft procedures. We could use that immediately to start seeing who, within our Task Forces, already has that capability. We wouldn't have to wait until the standards are final to actually start developing that capability.
And as has been pointed out before, California already has eight teams that are really ready to go right now.
Mrs. FOWLER. Now, I want to ask you a question, because FEMA is the coordinating agency for response to major disasters. So since they are, why shouldn't FEMA be the coordinating agency for development of a water rescue-typing standard?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. It's primarily because typing of these types of resources really are the responsibility of State and local government. We don't normally get into telling State and local governments what a strike team should look like, or what a water rescue team should look like. Normally, that is done at the State and local level. Again, the NFPA has worked with the fire community to set those kinds of standards. We are proposing this particular water rescue capability that is normally in common practice among the fire community. But again I think we can play a facilitating role in making this happen. Page 36 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, but you get into the example where if you are relying on EMAC on that compact to supplement existing water resource capabilities and California is not a participating member of EMAC. So then that would leave the California teams, which are right now probably the best in the country, off the list of available resources. So wouldn't FEMA's organizational involvement solve that type of problem?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. No, ma'am, it wouldn't, because they are already a member of our system. If the State asked, we could use our system to respond. What we need EMAC to do is, in addition to the 27 departments that participate in our program, there are probably hundreds of other jurisdictions out there that have a water resource capability. What we are saying is EMAC should serve as the facilitator to help mobilize those resources when requested by a state in need.
And, again, if EMAC can't provide it, we can provide it through our system. So it is really a two-tiered approach.
Mrs. FOWLER. If you develop standards that differed from those of NEMA, then would the resources be able to work together?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. We would not—we would work hand in hand with NEMA, and have in EMAC for the last 5 years, and I don't see that happening.
Mrs. FOWLER. I want to ask you another thing. To your knowledge, does the Emergency Management Institute, which is run by FEMA, currently offer any classes that deal with water rescue?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. No it does not.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, I hope that's going to be something that's reviewed also, because again I would think that institute would be another place where we could be educating and training people. So we need to do that.
I have got several other questions that I'm going to want to submit for the record because I know we've got limited time. I have two more to ask you now and then—could you just describe for me FEMA's present water rescue capabilities? Page 37 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. BAUGHMAN. We have none.
Mrs. FOWLER. You have none.
Mr. BAUGHMAN. We have none.
Mrs. FOWLER. I know you have sent out a questionnaire just this past month to your 27 US&R task forces to determine what capabilities they might have. What is your time frame on getting a response back?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Again, one of the things is the need for additional resources to carry that out. Right now I have got a relatively small staff that is engaged full-time in implementing our Urban Search and Rescue Program. We have basically 5,000 fire personnel and emergency medical personnel in that system, and we can't just ignore them while we deal with water rescue. So we have a need to get additional resources before we can do that.
However, I think that the questionnaire and some of the work on that could be done sometime within the next 90 to 120 days.
Mrs. FOWLER. And what is your estimated cost of implementing?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. If we were to implement what I see our role would be, the cost would be a couple of personnel, staff, and probably less than $500,000 in travel and miscellaneous funding.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, then I would like to thank each of our witnesses for their testimony, and I do have some additional questions for FEMA, which I will submit in writing. And will look forward to a written response that we will make part of the record. We have heard the tragic and compelling stories of Earl Higgins and Adam Bischoff; and sadly, as we have noted today, there are hundreds of similar stories that could be told.
And while this hearing is concluded, the danger has not. Flooding can victimize virtually every community in the United States. And as we have heard, many of these communities are ill-prepared to deal with these impending dangers. What is most disturbing, though, is that the urban search and rescue teams that FEMA has repeatedly deployed to assist these communities are also ill-prepared. They lack the equipment and the training to adequately protect even themselves, much less the public, for swift water rescue. Page 38 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Due to the efforts of people like Congressman Bilbray and Congresswoman Morella and the other witnesses we have heard from today, we may be able to reduce the risk that flooding poses to the public and to the rescuers themselves. These dangers are also detailed in an upcoming program that was produced for the Discovery Channel. I had an opportunity to review the program earlier this week, and it will feature Nancy Rigg and will air on the Discovery Channel on Wednesday, March 1st at 9 p.m. I encourage anyone that's interested in this subject to watch this compelling program. I watched it the other night, and it's very well done and very educational. Again, I want to thank Ms. Rigg for her involvement in this because it's something that I want to make sure that a lot of people watch. After this hearing, I'm going to be working with Mr. Traficant to request that FEMA prepare for this subcommittee a needs assessment detailing their procedures and the resources that you will need to adopt an adequate water rescue capability. And it's my hope and expectation that FEMA will work with the subcommittee and all interested parties to develop the proper skills and techniques to identify the necessary equipment, and prepare the needed operational guidelines so that the next time flood waters rise, we will be able to do more than just stand on the banks and watch people drown. So, again, I want to thank the people who have worked on this today. We do continue to keep working because this is of critical importance to the people of this country, and we look forward to working with FEMA and continue to work with Ms. Rigg and Chief Miller and the individuals who have been so active in this. If there are no other questions or comments. Mr. Bilbray, do you have anything further? Mr. BILBRAY. Madam Chair I would just like to thank you again and let me—I appreciate the fact that you recognize the urgency we brought forward; and as somebody who has decided to return to private life, we hope that when the river rises in Jacksonville as a civilian, you will know that the river rescue people will be there to save you if you need it. Page 39 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. Thank you again. The meeting of the subcommittee is adjourned. [Whereupon, at 3:36 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/Trans/hpw106-68.000/hpw106-68_1.HTM
Wednesday, February 16, 2000
House of Representatives, Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations and Emergency Management, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Washington, D.C.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:07 p.m., in Room 2167, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tillie K. Fowler [chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Mrs. FOWLER. The subcommittee will come to order. We have got some votes that are scheduled again in about 15, 20 minutes, and those will go on for two votes. We thought we would go ahead and start the hearing and we will have to recess when we have those two votes and start back up. But in the interest of time, we wanted to go ahead and begin and we are waiting on two members, but I thought I would go ahead and give my opening statement. Today's hearing examines a proposal for augmenting the Federal Emergency Management Agency's existing Urban Search and Rescue Program to include water rescue expertise. Flooding is the single greatest recurring natural disaster in the United States causing nearly 100 deaths each year. Approximately 10 percent of these deaths are public safety personnel attempting water rescues. We hear statistics like this all the time, but these statistics are not just numbers. They are people like you or me who get trapped in an overwhelming situation. I can think of no better way to get this point across than to introduce you to one of these victims, Adam Bischoff. And if they would roll the tape. This is a tape about Adam. [Video tape played.]
Mrs. FOWLER. We lose 100 Adam Bischoffs every year to floods. Representatives Brian Bilbray and Connie Morella have put forward a proposal that I think will save lives. I will let them explain it, and we will hear from experts regarding their idea. But first I would like to recognize our ranking member, Mr. Traficant, for his opening statement. Page 10 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. TRAFICANT. I want to thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I see the bells are ringing. I want to first start off by saying that I didn't realize you were retiring after this term and would not be back with us. I want to say that that will be a loss to not only this Congress, but to the country, and we certainly are going to miss you.
Probably Congresswoman Morella and Congressman Bilbray did not come over because they heard there would be this vote. I will not belabor my statement. I reiterate the fact that we talk about a lot of exciting disasters. We hate disasters, but there are some that get a lot more headlines. Floods seem not to get the type of disastrous headlines as others, although there are more deaths and tragedies many times attached if we really would look into them.
But most of all, I want to comment a little bit about FEMA. I have, over the years, had some good relationships with FEMA. We had a tornado through our district. I think they worked hard and closely and together with me. But there is one troubling matter that I have about today's hearing. From my years of experience, I was under the impression that FEMA was to have promulgated and had set in place a plan similar to that which we are now discussing, deliberating, and in fact ultimately will be deciding upon. Evidently, Madam Chairwoman, FEMA has never developed that plan. That, to me, is troubling.
So I think the authority is there for the agency to act. I think they should have by now. And I noticed that two of our more effective Congressmembers are here, and I know that we have votes coming up, so I will ask unanimous consent that my entire written statement be spread across the record. Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Mr. Traficant. We do have a vote on, which I know the vote is on final passage so it only is one vote instead of the two we thought we would have. So I believe if it is all right we will recess briefly to go vote and then come back and start so we won't have to stop in the middle of your testimony. So the subcommittee is recessed for the vote. Thank you. Page 11 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
[Recess.] Mrs. FOWLER. The subcommittee will come back to order. Our ranking member had to leave. This was our last vote for the day so at least we will not have any more interruptions. We have a couple of other members that will be joining us.
I would like to call the witnesses for the first panel. We are honored to have two Members of Congress testify before the subcommittee today, the Honorable Brian Bilbray of California and the Honorable Connie Morella of Maryland. The standard procedure of this subcommittee is to swear in all witnesses, so please stand and raise your right hand. [Witnesses sworn.]TESTIMONY OF HON. BRIAN BILBRAY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM CALIFORNIA; AND HON. CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM MARYLAND
Mrs. FOWLER. We will first hear testimony from Mr. Bilbray and then Mrs. Morella. Brian Bilbray represents the 14th District of California. A native of California, Mr. Bilbray has been an advocate for his district and the San Diego area for more than 20 years. But Mr. Bilbray has been most well known for his hands-on approach to protecting his constituents. Notably, and of particular relevance to this hearing, in 1993, he helped rescue people and animals during heavy flooding along the Tijuana River Valley. So we are honored to have you with us today, and Mr. Bilbray you may proceed.
Mr. BILBRAY. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I guess old lifeguards can be called back into service once in a while. That is a difference between old lifeguards and old politicians. I want to first thank you for holding this hearing, and I want to thank the full committee, Chairman Bud Shuster for allowing us to participate today. I also want to give credit to the ranking member, Mr. Traficant, for his encouragement on this issue. He is a hands-on type of person that all of us relate to. And with his background in public safety, I think he understands the unique situation here and the challenge and the opportunity we have. Page 12 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
I would also think that we need to thank Nancy Rigg and Chris Brewster for flying across the country to be able to bring the message from California. And let me say, Madam Chair, as a former lifeguard of San Diego County beaches, I happened to have served as the disaster preparedness chairman for 2.8 million people of that county a few years later and after the flooding we had in the 1990's, where actually Chris Brewster called me and asked me to get involved because I not only had some lifeguard background, but I knew the specific area, the Tiajuana River Valley where we were rescuing drowning illegal aliens, resident citizens, and also horses and dogs and cats.
And so when we talk about this too we are not just talking about saving human lives. We also are talking about our animal friends out there and companions that we want to rescue. At the same time, I have seen how the system works. I have had the experience of being asked to come here and work with the San Diego Lifeguard Service at Cabin John to be able to do programs in the Potomac River at night. And let me assure you that the capabilities of local communities to be able to respond and aid in the Federal responsibility under FEMA is there today and ready. The big challenge is will Washington rise to the occasion of drawing on these resources and expanding them.
It is clear to me, as an ex-chairman of emergency services and ex-lifeguard, but mostly as a representative of the people today, that there are great opportunities that are being overlooked. When I watched the Mississippi River rise and recently when I watched the flooding in North Carolina with the firsthand knowledge I have, it is just frustrating to see that the resources are not made available to save the lives of human beings, to avoid the type of deaths that we saw, and also protecting the wildlife and the domestic stock. FEMA is the agency to do this. FEMA is the agency that should have the responsibility and continues to have this responsibility. Page 13 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
I would like to say to you quite sincerely, I appreciate my colleague from Maryland joining with me on this because I think it is an example that this is not a West Coast or East Coast, it is not a South Coast or North Coast issue. This is an American issue. That if lifeguards from the Potomac, lifeguards from San Diego can show up in the Ohio River and rescue lives, we not only have a right but a responsibility to do that.
And I want to assure you of one thing. This is not a program that you just take people off the shelf and have them go do river rescue. It is unique training not just from the training point of view, but the mentality of the personnel involved, just ask the SEAL team instructors. The first thing they do is tie people up and throw them in the water and see if they panic. Not everyone out there is qualified or should be asked to perform rescues. You do not put a rescue vest on somebody and make them a lifeguard or a river rescue person.
And I think that is very important from a public safety point of view. Probably less than 20 percent of our population is suitable for this type of work. At the same time, you don't expect a firefighter to show up in full turnout gear and get in and around a water environment. And as a lifeguard, I cringe at the threat to their safety doing that.
But I leave you with this issue. Spring is coming. We are already seeing the snow melt in the West, causing flooding in California. The question that is going to be brought before us as representatives of the people is why we haven't taken action now to prepare FEMA to make sure that when the waters rise this spring, that there are lifeguards and rescue people there to save lives. Because if we don't, you know that every life lost we will be blamed either indirectly for our lack of action. So I ask you to join with us in calling on FEMA and everyone involved in this issue nationally to be able to draw resources so when somebody needs to be rescued, that lifeguard is there to pull them out of that river. Thank you very much.
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Representative Bilbray. We will now hear from representative Morella. Mrs. Morella has represented the Eighth District of Maryland in Congress for 7 terms and serves as a very strong advocate for the constituents in her district. And one of her constituents is Steve Miller, who will be one of the witnesses on our second panel and who is co-author of the flood rescue proposal. So we are honored to have you with us today. Page 14 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. MORELLA. Thank you Madam Chair. I really want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for having this hearing. I appreciate you doing that. Again, Chairman Shuster, who also believes that this was a good idea, members of the subcommittee and the fact that we do have this hearing, it is very important.
I also want to commend my colleague, Brian Bilbray from California, who has done such a great job in spearheading this very important project. I also want to comment on the fact that not only will Steve Miller be here, Steve is as you mentioned, the Cabin John Fire Department chief. He is a constituent, comes with great credentials, has always been most concerned about saving people and what fire rescue is all about. He is a deputy chief of the Cabin John Fire Department. He is a team leader and the chief of water rescue for Montgomery County River Rescue and Tactical Service Team. That means he is responsible for all the Potomac and moving water rescue in Montgomery County. He has been with Montgomery county for 30 years. Additionally he has been a career firefighter for the District of Columbia for 25 years, working the past 6 years with the rescue boats in the D.C. Fire Department. So he has tremendous credentials for this particular plan.
And also the San Diego lifeguard lieutenant, Marshall Parks, will be testifying. They have developed a compelling proposal that will save many lives in types of floods. I also was very pleasantly surprised to have President King Jordan here who is the President of Gallaudet. It almost sounds redundant to say ''President King.'' that is kind of a double epithet. And also a woman who has taken a tragedy and works very hard to develop it into an action plan to help others. I appreciate her commitment.
Aside from fires, flooding is the most common and widespread natural disaster, claiming the lives of 100 people each year in America. Most communities are susceptible to this danger during spring rains, heavy thunderstorms, and as the snow melts during a winter thaw. Tragically, 1 percent of those who are killed each year are emergency personnel attempting to rescue without the adequate training or equipment. Page 15 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Unlike earthquakes, tornadoes or lightning strikes, flooding can be predicted. Last year, Hurricane Floyd was detected just off the Bahamas on a course likely to make an East Coast landfall. Moving at 14 miles per hour, Floyd left plenty of time for an accounting of flood response resources and an assessment of dangerous areas. A coordinated local and regional response could have been prepared. Colloquial alert teams should have been supplemented by resources from other localities in the region as the flooding continued in some areas. And as time elapsed, skilled rescue workers from across the country, acting on a Federal effort, could have provided relief and support for the overburdened local and regional personnel as the flood crested and subsided.
Unfortunately, no such plan was in place and while local response teams in North Carolina exhausted themselves over the week-long deluge, available resources in Maryland were never deployed.
Often, even within states, there is little coordination of flood response efforts. In June of 1996, heavy rains caused serious flooding in Frederick, Maryland, just north of my district. Rescue workers heroically struggled to assist flood victims but were overwhelmed by the elements. They simply lacked the skills and materials that were necessary for these situations. Fortunately, one volunteer firefighter knew that there were resources available in neighboring Montgomery County and took the initiative to call the Cabin John Fire Department for assistance. Having secured permission from the county governments, the flood response team was dispatched from my district to assist the people of Frederick.
Of the seven people rescued by the Cabin John team, three had been emergency personnel who had been put in danger attempting the rescue themselves. The bottom line, Madam Chair, FEMA needs to implement a plan to lay out the processes and procedures for responding to flood emergencies. Locally, emergency managers need to be educated to understand what conditions exist that may place their jurisdiction in danger of flood conditions at any time. Page 16 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
This information is already available from the U.S. Geological Survey. They need to understand what resources they have available and how to request further assistance when necessary. And at the State and regional level, there needs to be coordination so that resources can quickly be shifted to support areas of greater need, even across State borders.
Emergency personnel need to understand that there are people they can call when they are overwhelmed. And as flood conditions persist, there needs to be a plan for a Federal response to assist the continuing evacuation. And as the water subsides, the cleanup. The pieces by and large, are already in place. If there were a plan of action for a coordinated strategy of flood emergencies, the needless loss of life and property can be prevented.
I hope this subcommittee will move with that effort in mind. And I thank you, Madam Chair. Mrs. FOWLER. I thank you, Mrs. Morella. First before we go further, Mr. Terry, I would like to recognize the vice chairman of the subcommittee. Do you have anything? Thank you. I want to thank both the distinguished members for their testimony today and for their involvement in bringing this lifesaving proposal to our attention. I look forward to working with both of you in the future as we continue to examine this issue and move forward on it. Thank you so much for all of your work on it.
The Chair now calls the witnesses for the second panel. First, Nancy Rigg from Los Angeles, California. Mrs. Rigg is an author, documentary film producer, and flood safety education specialist. We will next hear from Deputy Chief Steve Miller from the Cabin John Park, Maryland, Volunteer Fire Department. Both of these witnesses are experts in the area of water rescue and water rescue education.
As with the first panel, we will swear in the witnesses, so if you would please stand and raise your right hand. Page 17 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
[Witnesses sworn.]TESTIMONY OF NANCY J. RIGG, FLOOD SAFETY EDUCATION SPECIALIST, LOS ANGELES, CA; AND STEPHEN F. MILLER, SR., DEPUTY FIRE/RESCUE CHIEF, CABIN JOHN PARK VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT, CABIN JOHN PARK, MD Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. We ask that you summarize your testimony in 5 minutes, and without objection your full written statements will be included in the record. Ms. Rigg if you would proceed first.
Ms. RIGG. Madam Chairwoman, members of the committee, my name is Nancy Rigg.
Tomorrow, February 17th, marks the 20th anniversary of the death of my fiance, Earl Higgins, who lost his life when he attempted to rescue a 12-year-old boy who slipped into the flood-swollen Los Angeles River. The child survived by some miracle, but Earl was swept 30 miles downstream past rescuers who had neither the training nor equipment to perform an effective swift water or flood rescue. Earl's remains were not recovered until 9 months later.
This unfortunate event, which ended Earl's life at age 29 and changed my life forever, may at first appear to be a local problem, something that has little to do with the Federal Government. The local emergency response capability was simply inadequate. But Earl died during a major flood, where more than 25 other lives were also lost, and the event became a federally declared disaster. And this deadly scenario has repeated itself time and again, flood after flood after flood over the years. This is not just a local, State, or regional problem. This is a national tragedy.
Flooding is the leading cause of weather-related death nationwide. Deadly floods strike all regions of this country with a force that is unimaginable, killing hundreds of people every year and leaving emotional scars on survivors that can last a live time. You would think that with the specter of this kind of disaster hovering over every watershed in the United States, disaster managers, rescue agencies, and educators would be clamoring to prepare. But the prevailing attitude is, floods? We don't have that problem here. Page 18 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Earl died in 1980, and despite scores of additional flood deaths, it took another 12 years before Los Angeles finally created the comprehensive multiagency swift water rescue program and public education programs that are now routinely saving lives and setting new standards of preparedness worldwide.
Those of us whose loved ones died before the swift water rescue teams were created may feel a sense of proud legacy, but the cost to us has been tremendous. How many families are now in mourning as a result of the floods from hurricane Floyd, which killed nearly 100 people, 51 in North Carolina alone? That storm sat off the East Coast for a week waving its huge red flag, 'I'm coming, get ready, get your flood rescue teams in place.' How is it then that everybody except the national weather service was caught by surprise when floods of biblical proportions were unleashed? The response was a discombobulated, reactive scramble by untrained rescuers and National Guard troops to 'do something,' instead of a proactive, precision strike, with highly skilled Federal, State, and local swift-water and flood rescue teams prepositioned, working together, and ready to go.
Hundreds of 911 calls went unanswered for 8 to 10 hours because no one was available to come help. Congressmembers Brian Bilbray and Constance Morella are the first national leaders to bring this tragedy into the public forum, and I wholeheartedly support their flood rescue team proposal. We need the kind of commitment for national flood preparedness that we have for terrorism preparedness, where Federal officials work with the states and local communities and they say, 'We don't want to hear that you have never had terrorist incidents here, so you don't need this training.'
A federally sponsored network of flood rescue teams could do more than save lives during major disasters. With their knowledge and expertise, they could work with states and local communities as Federal ambassadors of flood preparedness, where they could say, 'We have got to do something, it's not a matter of if, it is a matter of when you are going to get a major flood. You need to have a plan; you need to educate the public. Your rescue teams need flood rescue training and equipment, and your disaster managers need to know how to oversee a dynamic event where lives will be lost in an instant if you are not on top of things. We will provide you with our assistance now, as well as during a major disaster. Let's work together on this.' Page 19 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
The flood rescue team proposal should be implemented immediately. All it takes is leadership, organization, and a commitment to save lives. Please, support this proposal and take action now, because if you don't, flood rescue programs will continue to be built on the graves of people who could and should have been rescued. I admire what FEMA is doing in general, but why are we spending all of this time and effort and money on saving property and nothing on saving lives? Thank you.
Mrs. FOWLER. Chief Miller, you may proceed. Thank you.
Mr. MILLER. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Every year flooding occurs in different areas of the United States. The cost in human life is high, up to 200 persons per year.
Mrs. FOWLER. Could you pull the mike a little closer? Mr. MILLER. Many of these floods are due to the heavy rains that accompany hurricanes. Most of these floods develop over a period of several days to a week. All floods have three stages: fast-rising water, cresting moving water, and receding water. Many rescues are made during the fast-rising stage. People become trapped in or near their automobiles attempting to drive through the high water. Persons who reside near waterways may be trapped in their homes as the foundations are weakened by strong currents and washed away.
This is perhaps the most critical stage of a flood. Most of the high-profile rescues are made at this time, and there is a great risk factor for rescuers. The United States Fire Administration has stated that a firefighter is four times—four times more likely to lose his or her life attempting a swift-water rescue than in an actual working structure fire.
During the cresting moving water stage, the majority of rescues or evacuations are made by rescue boats. These boats proceed through towns and neighborhoods removing people from the roof tops or other high points. It should be noted that during this stage the situation may rapidly deteriorate again, due to levee or dam failures or other natural causes. With almost no warning, the rescuers and evacuees may be confronted with fast moving water again. Page 20 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
In the final stages of a flood, the waters recede and the danger from hazardous and toxic materials is high. Dead livestock, fertilizers and other waste must be dealt with. The rescuers will begin to leave the area in favor of the cleanup crews and hazardous materials experts.
At this time there is no national coordination of personnel trained in flood rescue. Most flood rescues are currently attempted by local rescue groups and military helicopters with little or no training in flood response. These resources are rapidly overwhelmed and seldom predeployed. Often, trained swift water teams are not dispatched until after the fact. Regional coordination is almost nonexistent. During the most current major flooding as a result of Hurricane Floyd, many trained rescue teams within a reasonable response time sat idle while untrained Federal groups were sent to the flooded areas with little or no training and no water rescue equipment. The exception was a task force from Pennsylvania. This task force had received formal swift water rescue training, not as part of their USAR training program, and they brought their own water rescue equipment. They were successful in rescuing over 30 people.
Advocates for a change believe that with the Federal Government assistance, many lives could be saved annually. This assistance could come in three ways: public education, support for the development, training and equipping of local and regional flood rescue teams, and by enhancing the equipment and training of some of the current USAR teams.
Public education could be accomplished in the drivers education programs, with public service announcements, and by the development of a national education program similar to that developed by Nancy Rigg, which is currently in use in California.
Development of flood/swift-water rescue resources: it is felt that the most effective way to address this problem is to develop properly trained and equipped flood/swift-water rescue teams at local, state and national levels. How this would be accomplished is currently subject to a great deal of debate in the flood/swift-water rescue community. But regardless of how this is achieved, once it is in place, it must be effective, efficient, and properly managed. These resources must be deployed in a proactive, rather than a reactive, manner. Page 21 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
These teams must be highly motivated, well equipped and well trained. They will be asked to perform their mission in a dangerous and dynamic environment, entering flood-swollen creeks and rivers to effect contact rescues as well as operating boats for rescue and evacuation purposes. Careful thought should be given to the location of the state and national teams, for their training must be constant and in the environment in which they will operate.
Three and four day classes with yearly re-certs, while necessary, are quite frankly insufficient. These teams will, out of necessity, need to spend a great deal of their time in training in addition to their normal duties. It would be a disservice to both the rescuers and the public to select groups that are unable to devote the great amount of time necessary to enable them to function effectively and safely in this environment.
In conclusion, I firmly believe that most of the pieces of this puzzle are on the table. However, they need to be organized and joined together in order to resolve this national problem. Persons with the expertise to accomplish this task are readily available and more than willing to work with whatever agencies are assigned the task of mitigating this problem. I would like to thank Lieutenant Marshall Parks, who unfortunately could not be here with us today, of the San Diego Lifeguard Service. He was instrumental in helping to put this together. And the Honorable Congresswoman Morella and Congressman Bilbray, the members of this committee, and the entire swift-water rescue community for their assistance and guidance in this effort.
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Chief Miller. I want to thank both of you for your testimony, and I have a few questions and I think Mr. Terry might have some also.
Ms. Rigg, as we know and I have been reading so much of this background, you were so instrumental in the development of California's water rescue response system, and as your testimony stated, it is important that this type of system go nationwide. Having heard the description of the proposal described by Chief Miller, what effect do you think that would have on the ability of local governments to respond to these flood disasters? Page 22 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Ms. RIGG. I think that the most important thing is that the training and the planning be federally guided but also coordinated through the States and the local governments.
The first responders are going to be the ones more than likely who are first on scene. Those are the local teams. In many cases like in North Carolina, these are volunteer search and rescue teams who lack the means or the support to gear themselves up and get basic flood awareness training, so they know how to protect themselves. So the California system that we have now involves the eight task force teams that are deployed through the Office of Emergency Services and FEMA. We have added swift water rescue components to those so you have eight federally supported and state supported teams who then work with the local teams which get pretty well overwhelmed in the early stages when they are working 36 hours straight.
So I think it is a great model. We are still improving upon it to get people in place in time. There's this structure of Federal reaction as opposed to preparation. And that is what has got to be worked on. Because if you're going to do life saving, you've got to be there, and that is the biggest barrier to overcome, not come in after the fact.
Mrs. FOWLER. You have set up my next question. That is great. One of the questions that has been raised is, how would your proposal, Chief Miller, address concerns that a Federal water rescue team would be unable to promptly respond to most flooding?
Mr. MILLER. The team must be proactive, as I stated. They must be on the move just before the event occurs. And they will be utilized, there is no doubt, after a major flood. The initial team is always overwhelmed. There is always too much work for them and the time period that they must operate in is several days to a week, and we have to remember that those local rescue teams have the worry, the added burden of the fact that it's their neighborhood, their town. They are trying to get their lives back in shape too.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, how would, under your proposal, how would the Federal response to Hurricane Floyd have been different, and could more lives have been saved if this proposal had been in effect? Page 23 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. MILLER. As Nancy put it, if you are going to save a life in a water rescue situation, in any water rescue situation, you have to be there to do it. You can't come in after the fact. If a plan would have been in place to coordinate the local groups to support them with the Federal teams, I think we could have saved quite a few lives in the state.
Mrs. FOWLER. And Ms. Rigg, I know in California you have the State office of Emergency Services Swift Water Rescue Advisory Committee. How effective has that been, and in your opinion would that type of advisory committee serve as a good role model for FEMA's efforts?
Ms. RIGG. Absolutely. I think it would be an excellent role model. Because what they have done is broken it down into working groups. Like the helicopter rescue group, so you get all the helicopter pilots trained; the ground based; the boat based. Everybody is working together. You have got multi-agency, law enforcement, firefighters and lifeguards all working together equally in this working group. They meet frequently. They have been developing standards. Hello. They have been developing the whole protocol of response.
That model could almost just be—if it could be replicated like a virus and spread nationwide—we'd be saving lives and I think floods would become the last cause of death in weather-related incidents. But it's an excellent program. As I said, it is still in development; but it is a great place to start rather than reinventing the wheel. Mrs. FOWLER. I want to ask Mr. Lee Terry from Nebraska, the vice chairman of the committee, any questions that you might have.
Mr. TERRY. Well, I do. First of all, we do have flooding in Nebraska. It's not just a coastal thing as Brian had mentioned. Ours fall into two categories. Every spring with the melt, of which now we are gripped in a drought, so this year we don't have to deal with it, but that is predictable. Part of the education every spring about the end of February, all the news stations start running about how when the flood waters start coming over the road, don't drive into it. Page 24 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
So I am curious what your research has shown about the number of the deaths that occur in this type of flooding is caused by—boy, I don't want to belittle anybody but people's ignorance. You know, you see a street then you see water over the street, you don't drive through it. That type of lack of education and boldness as opposed to other types. Whenever I see news clippings, it's usually somebody in a car that was foolish. So what is the role of education in this? And let's go with Ms. Rigg on this since that has been part of your fight.
Ms. RIGG. I think the role of education is critical. Especially if you don't have anybody there to rescue anybody. At least tell people, you know, let them know that if they get caught in flood waters that they are going to be on their own. But more to the point, Chief Miller was suggesting that this be integrated into drivers education. I grew up in Colorado, and one of the first things we learned was if the street was moving, don't go into it. I think something like 80 percent of all deaths in swift water are automobile-related.
Mr. TERRY. I didn't know it was that high. Ms. RIGG. Many people drive right around the barriers into the wash and get swept away. I think education is extremely important. But again we need Federal leadership to get this message out. I have from my studies, the program that I developed in California, we are one of the only States dealing with swift water, period. In any form. And we need more effort nationwide to educate everybody, not just people in California. So I think it is a critical area to be—to be included.
Mr. TERRY. The second type of flooding that occurs happened in my hometown this last August relying on—the weather folks predicted some heavy rains and did not predict a 10-inch rain in a matter of about 3 hours, which of course streams that were 1 foot deep became overwhelming and a couple of people did lose their lives, mostly because homes were close. Page 25 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
But nonetheless that is an occurrence where it was unpredicted. And it seems to me that type of situation, what we need to do is better train our first responders, our fire department. And you say that you have a model that has been developed in California, and Brian has referenced that to me when we were on the floor voting about half an hour ago. But what would you suggest, Mr. Miller and Ms. Rigg? But how do we take that to the Omaha, Nebraska, city government and fire department to implement this? Even though it's fairly rare, it occurs in Omaha, Nebraska, every few years.
Ms. RIGG. May I start?
Mr. MILLER. Absolutely.
Ms. RIGG. All fire departments train to fight high-rise fires, but high-rise fires may happen once in a decade. It doesn't mean they don't train regularly to handle high-rise fires. All airports that have a certain level of commercial traffic have an airport crash team that is always ready. I think flooding happens, on average, in every community more frequently than any one airport gets a plane crash, and yet there is this ever-ready state of readiness. So to me it is a matter of getting the issue of flood rescue to register on the radar. Period. We need firefighters to realize that this is for their own safety. As you know, 10 percent get killed every year in water-related incidents and four out of five deaths in technical rescues are water-related. So in that sense, the Omaha Fire Department, if it doesn't have a swift-water rescue team, would be well to get themselves up to the current standard.
And Chief Miller, you probably have a few things to add too.
Mr. MILLER. I believe that the best way to get that message out as far as the fire service is concerned, the managers of the fire departments have to be educated themselves. Many of them just don't want to recognize this as a problem. Perhaps programs through the National Fire Academy, United States Fire Administration would be helpful in this area. Page 26 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
It should be part of every firefighter's training. Every firefighter should be trained at least to an awareness level that we have a situation here and if we are not capable of handling it, we know exactly who to call and how to get them there. Mr. TERRY. You raise a good point. Let me follow up on that. We send a lot of our firefighters for training—in fact I have got a group of my Omaha firefighters that are going to be out here in training facilities next week or the week after. As part of this model, would you suggest that we identify maybe the San Diego lifeguards or your organization that we would identify swift water as a need for training and send them to you? Does this already exist?
Mr. MILLER. Well, actually we do joint training with the lifeguard river rescue team now. That is a one-to-one thing.
Certainly, we would be more than willing to train other groups. But it's going to be at a great expense to the people of Nebraska. Their programs should be developed at their State level, depending on the State. I am not very familiar with your system; all training might come under the office of the fire marshall, and he could dictate that they are required to have this training.
Different jurisdictions do it in different ways. Right now the University of Maryland MFRI has just become heavily involved in training swift water responders. So it could be done at the state level.
Ms. RIGG. May I add one thing? It's not just firefighters who need the training. Anyone who is working in a flood, whether it is a utility worker, a Department of Transportation worker, a police officer, they need the basic training to keep themselves from getting killed. In North Carolina, two Department of Transportation workers were killed when they were out working in the floods. So somebody needs to say—somebody needs to wake this country up and say, hello, water is killing people. That's really what it gets down to. Everybody would prefer to go to sleep on this issue until it happens to them and until it's their loved one. That's what I am begging you guys to do is say wake up and see what is actually killing people in this country every year. We've got to do something about this. Page 27 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. TERRY. It is important. I am curious, Mr. Miller, what type of equipment—. Mr. MILLER. Sorry sir? Mr. TERRY. What type of equipment is necessary if I am going to focus on how do we get the first responders prepared, police and fire coordinated, what kind of equipment—my friend Mr. Bilbray from California had given me this vision of our firemen and their heavy fighting gear out trying to rescue someone in the water. So what would you suggest as equipment?
Mr. MILLER. There are national standards out there, standards of the industry for the types of PFDs, personal flotation devices, life jackets, wet suits for the lifeguards, dry suits. One of the problems in a flooding situation is you've got all this stuff in the water that doesn't really belong there, and you are being exposed to it. It's very hazardous to your health. In that situation, dry suits, helmets. The type of rescue ropes that you use, line throwing devices. All of this. It's not a real secret. The information's out there. The fire department managers or emergency managers of all types must be encouraged to make sure that their personnel receive this education. And where to get the equipment is not hard. That can be pointed out to them readily.
Mr. TERRY. We do a lot of training. Our fire department does a lot of training in the lake rescues. How is swift water different from lake or muddy flowing river?
Mr. MILLER. They are both wet and that's about the similarity.
Mr. TERRY. I will give you that one.
Mr. MILLER. Just a couple of inches of moving water, if it is moving fast enough, will knock you off your feet. It is a very dynamic environment and it changes constantly. It takes a great deal of expertise to learn how to operate a rescue boat in moving water as opposed to just getting in a boat and driving down a flat lake. Certainly if that's the area that your people are detecting, they do need to know how to effect those types of rescues. But a swift water rescue is entirely different. The level of expertise is much, much higher. Page 28 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
San Diego lifeguard team, speaking with Marshall 2 years ago, and he was speaking with some of the emergency managers in Montgomery County. Marshall's team does cliff rescues, dive rescue, a very wide array of different types of rescues as well as surf rescues. And he stated in his personal opinion the most dangerous thing they train for is a swift water rescue.
Mr. TERRY. Thank you. I appreciate you being here.
Mrs. FOWLER. I just have a couple of other questions. Ms. Rigg, as you have examined flood and rescue readiness across the country, could you tell us approximately how many water rescue teams with formal training are there in this country?
Ms. RIGG. From my experience just communicating with a variety of teams nationwide, I can't give you, you know, a number like there's 2,000 rescuers or 20,000 rescuers. All I can say—what I can tell you more is that there aren't enough. California is coming around. Arizona has a pretty good program. Nevada has a pretty good program. Texas has a pretty good program. In North Carolina there are a lot of teams, but they were not in the eastern part of the state. They were all in the western part of the State.
More to the point it is a haphazard mishmash and not all of the teams are trained to the same level. You can have Firefighter Bob and his bass boat consider himself a rescue team for swift water, you know. So in terms—in terms of actually identifying resources, one of the things that needs to be done is to set the standard and identify who fits that pattern, because right now one of the problems is that the standard is so flexible and so amorphous that you don't necessarily have—I couldn't say that Omaha has a great swift water rescue program. In fact, I would doubt that they do. My dad was born in Omaha, so I like Omaha. But what I'm saying is that it is a mind-set that is missing, not just rescue teams. You have clusters in the West and clusters in the East and then some in the Midwest, a little bit here and there. But it is a mishmash. I'm sorry I can't be more specific. Page 29 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. No, but that helps us to see, because I think that is one of the problems that we need to be aware of. Chief Miller, we heard that a number of first responder rescuers die each year attempting water rescues. Are there any characteristics which cut across all of these tragedies as far as those that die, the rescuers?
Mr. MILLER. Two, actually. A lack of understanding of moving water and a lack of training to deal with that. As a firefighter for 30 years, the firefighter's mentality is that they called us, we are here and we are going to do something. It might not be the right thing to do, but we are going to do something. We are not going to stand here and have the press film us doing nothing. And that's what is killing rescuers.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, if adopted, would your proposal solve the problems that you and Ms. Rigg have identified today if we were able to get this moving?
Mr. MILLER. If adopted on a national basis? Obviously we are not going to save every life. But I think you would see a tremendous reduction in the number of lives lost in the United States.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, as a Member from Florida, we are very familiar in Florida with the problems from hurricanes and other floodings. We have a river that runs right through my city which, depending on the rains, if it is flooded or not. And I want to thank both of you for your bringing this to our attention and helping us to elevate it to national attention because that is what it takes to get movement on these things is to have people like yourself who spent so long working on this to help us educate people on the national level as to what the problem is and that there are solutions within reach of that.
And, Ms. Rigg, I think the work you have done for the past 20 years and the lives that you have saved are the most meaningful memorial that Earl could ever have. So thank you for all that you have done. We appreciate it. Thank you both. Page 30 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Ms. RIGG. Thank you. Mrs. FOWLER. The Chair would now call the witness for the third panel, Mr. Bruce Baughman. Mr. Baughman is from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. He holds the position of director, operations and planning division in the response and recovery directorate. Mr. Baughman as you know it is the standard procedure of this subcommittee to swear in all witnesses. If you would stand and raise your right hand.
[Witness sworn.]TESTIMONY OF BRUCE P. BAUGHMAN, DIRECTOR, OPERATIONS AND PLANNING DIVISION, RESPONSE AND RECOVERY DIRECTORATE, FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. Please be seated.
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the subcommittee. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before the subcommittee to discuss swift water rescue preparedness and response.
As has been stated before, a large percentage of the Nation's disasters are floods. The loss in such disasters has been considerable. In 1999 alone, 68 lives were lost to floods. Since 1990, fatalities have averaged 99 per year. Clearly there is a need to reduce loss of life from floods.
Again, as has already been stated, response to most flood rescue situations is handled by State and local governments which are generally well suited to respond rapidly for calls for assistance. However, flash flooding, which occurs with little or no warning, is among the most deadly and devastating of floods. Such states as California, Maryland, Texas and a number of communities have developed highly trained and well-equipped water rescue teams. Page 31 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
In order to make the most efficient and cost-effective use of rescue resources, FEMA believes primary reliance should be placed on existing intrastate and interstate mutual aid mechanisms rather than developing a new capability at the Federal level. One of the most promising interstate mutual aid mechanisms is an Emergency Management Assistance Compact, or EMAC. Membership in EMAC provides states with access to more resources and increases their ability to respond to major disasters and emergencies quicker. To date, 29 States have adopted EMAC.
However, the Nation is in need of a uniform standard for swift water rescue resources which would provide State and local emergency management officials with the assurance that responding units meet some minimum level of capability. And I think that this was stated already by Congressman Bilbray that it takes specialized training in swift water rescue.
Following Hurricane Floyd, at least seven EMAC states offered swift water assistance to North Carolina. Unfortunately, the State didn't know what to expect in terms of the resources being offered or their expertise in swift water rescue. The State of California has developed a draft-typing scheme that conforms to the incident command system standard. The scheme identifies capabilities, numbers of personnel, and transportation assets for each type of resource. This typing scheme should be adopted at the national level.
We believe that the National Emergency Management Association, or NEMA, as the implementer of EMAC could be an appropriate organization to coordinate this task. NEMA, which is made up of the Nation's state emergency management directors, and serves as a repository for other interstate mutual aid agreements, can also facilitate assistance to non-EMAC states during disasters. A number of individuals have advocated the creation of a national system of swift water rescue resources modeled after FEMA's National Urban Search and Rescue Response System. The swift water community appears to be divided about the appropriate model for this national system.
Our view is that the best use of the urban search and rescue model is to supplement State and local resources, not to replace them. FEMA could supplement State and local mutual aid efforts by deploying swift water rescue teams from within the departments that sponsor our existing Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces. With minimal additional resources, FEMA could use existing mechanisms to activate such teams when needed to supplement EMAC or other mutual aid resources or to provide resources when mutual aid resources are not available. Page 32 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
A number of departments participating in the Urban Search and Rescue Program have built swift water capabilities. The State of California has developed a water rescue component within each of its eight Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces.
Our goal would be to assess the existing capabilities within those departments that participate in our program that meet that typing standard. This approach would require only modest support to assess compliance with the adopted standards and to amend our current regulations and agreements to accommodate this new mission.
Development of any national program should take full advantage of existing rescue capability. In developing the Urban Search and Rescue Program, FEMA has expended over $21 million in Federal funds. The time to build a new system would be significant. We think that relying on existing mechanisms to the greatest extent possible would reduce both time required to save lives and the cost in responding.
In summary, the most significant improvement in the Nation's swift water rescue posture and corresponding decrease in number of lives lost could be accomplished through the following measures: .
First, that a consensus national standard for swift water rescue resources be adopted by an organization such as NEMA by exploring what already exists, such as the California model.
Second, that State and local governments maximize use of EMAC or other mutual aid agreements to supplement their existing water rescue capabilities.
And third, that FEMA assess existing water rescue capability within the departments that participate in its Urban Search and Rescue response system and make necessary policy, procedural and regulatory adjustments to enable those resources to supplement State and local government efforts. Before I conclude, Madam Chairman, I would like to, on behalf of Director Witt, thank you for your support for the mitigation program and for your work on the proposed changes to the Stafford Act. This concludes my comments. Page 33 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you, Mr. Baughman. I have a few questions, and I think Mr. Terry had to leave. Well, I understand that the President's budget request for fiscal year 2001 includes $3.825 million in antiterrorism funding to expand the urban search and rescue teams, but does not include any funding for flood rescue expertise. Is that correct?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. That is correct. That comes through—the counterterrorism appropriation that is directed primarily to outfit six of our existing task forces so that they are ready to respond to a weapon of mass destruction event.
Mrs. FOWLER. Since their inception, how many times has FEMA deployed the urban search and rescue teams?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. I think approximately 17 or 18 times we have deployed them.
Mrs. FOWLER. Is that average? Per year? How often?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. An average of about three times per year.
Mrs. FOWLER. Are they deployed solely for collapsed buildings?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. They are designed for collapsed structural buildings. We do predeploy and are proactive, contrary to popular belief. Sometimes, prior to a hurricane, FEMA does predeploy two Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces, several disaster medical units, and a number of other resources, teams, and commodities so that they are prestaged in potentially affected states.
In the past, the primary need on the part of State and local government for rescue resources has been for collapsed structures, not for water rescue. Very seldom, other than in North Carolina this year, have we been asked for that type of resource.
Mrs. FOWLER. So California hadn't asked you before?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. No, they have not. During the last floods in California, we did in fact use our system to deploy some resources to supplement their overhead capability in that particular disaster. Page 34 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. I would like to refer you to an enlarged exhibit over here. This is a copy of a letter that was sent by Director Witt to Nancy Rigg that was dated October 26, 1993. And I would like to enter the copy of the letter in the record. [The information follows:] [insert here]
Mrs. FOWLER. And a portion of that letter—and I believe you have seen this—reads as follows, and I quote: ''I support swift water rescue and flood safety education and will instruct my staff to identify ways that FEMA may become involved in encouraging such education programs and disseminating education materials.''.
Mr. Baughman, to your knowledge was this directive ever made; and if so, what was done to implement it?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. To my knowledge, no, it has not. I think certainly Director Witt would agree. I think that unfortunately, with time and other pressing matters we have not had the ability to follow through, and I think that this has raised the need to do that.
Mrs. FOWLER. So in your opinion then, you think FEMA will keep the commitment that was made in 1993?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Yes.
Mrs. FOWLER. But no request for funding for this type of commitment was made for the fiscal 2001 budget; is that correct?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. That's correct. Again, the most appropriate place within FEMA for this type of awareness would probably be the U.S. Fire Administration, and you know, we have a new Administrator. We also have a new Chief Operating Officer. I think once we have raised this to their level, we can accomplish it through there. Page 35 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
For what I have proposed, it will take some additional resources to accomplish.
Mrs. FOWLER. Returning back to your testimony, if as you propose FEMA makes the necessary procedure and regulatory adjustments to be able to provide water rescue resources as needed, would FEMA adopt its own standards or would it adopt the NEMA State standards?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. There is an NFPA standard 1670 that has been proposed. I think it needs work. I think what we would propose to do is set criteria for all our teams, based upon the California typing. I think it should be up to our U.S. Fire Administration working with the NFPA to come up with a nationwide standard, and we certainly would support that nationwide standard. Then you could use that to train personnel and equip water rescue units.
Mrs. FOWLER. If you would adopt whatever standards that NEMA would develop, then that would make your implementation time line dependent on their actions. So what measure would FEMA take to ensure a prompt development and implementation of standards?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Here is what we would do and we discussed this earlier. It would take us probably 60 to 90 day to develop some draft procedures. We could use that immediately to start seeing who, within our Task Forces, already has that capability. We wouldn't have to wait until the standards are final to actually start developing that capability.
And as has been pointed out before, California already has eight teams that are really ready to go right now.
Mrs. FOWLER. Now, I want to ask you a question, because FEMA is the coordinating agency for response to major disasters. So since they are, why shouldn't FEMA be the coordinating agency for development of a water rescue-typing standard?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. It's primarily because typing of these types of resources really are the responsibility of State and local government. We don't normally get into telling State and local governments what a strike team should look like, or what a water rescue team should look like. Normally, that is done at the State and local level. Again, the NFPA has worked with the fire community to set those kinds of standards. We are proposing this particular water rescue capability that is normally in common practice among the fire community. But again I think we can play a facilitating role in making this happen. Page 36 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, but you get into the example where if you are relying on EMAC on that compact to supplement existing water resource capabilities and California is not a participating member of EMAC. So then that would leave the California teams, which are right now probably the best in the country, off the list of available resources. So wouldn't FEMA's organizational involvement solve that type of problem?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. No, ma'am, it wouldn't, because they are already a member of our system. If the State asked, we could use our system to respond. What we need EMAC to do is, in addition to the 27 departments that participate in our program, there are probably hundreds of other jurisdictions out there that have a water resource capability. What we are saying is EMAC should serve as the facilitator to help mobilize those resources when requested by a state in need.
And, again, if EMAC can't provide it, we can provide it through our system. So it is really a two-tiered approach.
Mrs. FOWLER. If you develop standards that differed from those of NEMA, then would the resources be able to work together?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. We would not—we would work hand in hand with NEMA, and have in EMAC for the last 5 years, and I don't see that happening.
Mrs. FOWLER. I want to ask you another thing. To your knowledge, does the Emergency Management Institute, which is run by FEMA, currently offer any classes that deal with water rescue?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. No it does not.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, I hope that's going to be something that's reviewed also, because again I would think that institute would be another place where we could be educating and training people. So we need to do that.
I have got several other questions that I'm going to want to submit for the record because I know we've got limited time. I have two more to ask you now and then—could you just describe for me FEMA's present water rescue capabilities? Page 37 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mr. BAUGHMAN. We have none.
Mrs. FOWLER. You have none.
Mr. BAUGHMAN. We have none.
Mrs. FOWLER. I know you have sent out a questionnaire just this past month to your 27 US&R task forces to determine what capabilities they might have. What is your time frame on getting a response back?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. Again, one of the things is the need for additional resources to carry that out. Right now I have got a relatively small staff that is engaged full-time in implementing our Urban Search and Rescue Program. We have basically 5,000 fire personnel and emergency medical personnel in that system, and we can't just ignore them while we deal with water rescue. So we have a need to get additional resources before we can do that.
However, I think that the questionnaire and some of the work on that could be done sometime within the next 90 to 120 days.
Mrs. FOWLER. And what is your estimated cost of implementing?
Mr. BAUGHMAN. If we were to implement what I see our role would be, the cost would be a couple of personnel, staff, and probably less than $500,000 in travel and miscellaneous funding.
Mrs. FOWLER. Well, then I would like to thank each of our witnesses for their testimony, and I do have some additional questions for FEMA, which I will submit in writing. And will look forward to a written response that we will make part of the record. We have heard the tragic and compelling stories of Earl Higgins and Adam Bischoff; and sadly, as we have noted today, there are hundreds of similar stories that could be told.
And while this hearing is concluded, the danger has not. Flooding can victimize virtually every community in the United States. And as we have heard, many of these communities are ill-prepared to deal with these impending dangers. What is most disturbing, though, is that the urban search and rescue teams that FEMA has repeatedly deployed to assist these communities are also ill-prepared. They lack the equipment and the training to adequately protect even themselves, much less the public, for swift water rescue. Page 38 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Due to the efforts of people like Congressman Bilbray and Congresswoman Morella and the other witnesses we have heard from today, we may be able to reduce the risk that flooding poses to the public and to the rescuers themselves. These dangers are also detailed in an upcoming program that was produced for the Discovery Channel. I had an opportunity to review the program earlier this week, and it will feature Nancy Rigg and will air on the Discovery Channel on Wednesday, March 1st at 9 p.m. I encourage anyone that's interested in this subject to watch this compelling program. I watched it the other night, and it's very well done and very educational. Again, I want to thank Ms. Rigg for her involvement in this because it's something that I want to make sure that a lot of people watch. After this hearing, I'm going to be working with Mr. Traficant to request that FEMA prepare for this subcommittee a needs assessment detailing their procedures and the resources that you will need to adopt an adequate water rescue capability. And it's my hope and expectation that FEMA will work with the subcommittee and all interested parties to develop the proper skills and techniques to identify the necessary equipment, and prepare the needed operational guidelines so that the next time flood waters rise, we will be able to do more than just stand on the banks and watch people drown. So, again, I want to thank the people who have worked on this today. We do continue to keep working because this is of critical importance to the people of this country, and we look forward to working with FEMA and continue to work with Ms. Rigg and Chief Miller and the individuals who have been so active in this. If there are no other questions or comments. Mr. Bilbray, do you have anything further? Mr. BILBRAY. Madam Chair I would just like to thank you again and let me—I appreciate the fact that you recognize the urgency we brought forward; and as somebody who has decided to return to private life, we hope that when the river rises in Jacksonville as a civilian, you will know that the river rescue people will be there to save you if you need it. Page 39 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 2 Of 2
Mrs. FOWLER. Thank you. Thank you again. The meeting of the subcommittee is adjourned. [Whereupon, at 3:36 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/Trans/hpw106-68.000/hpw106-68_1.HTM
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