Sent to all Arlington County (VA) CERT members via e-mail 18 January 2004 A few CERT updates for you ... Welcome New CERT Members On January 10th, eight new CERT members completed their training and joined our team (now 144 strong!). These folks deserve special points for putting out fires and conducting the search and rescue exercise (twice!) on what was reported to be the coldest morning in eight years! Good thing no one had to put their first aid skills to work treating real-life hypothermia! Our new teammates are: A D of Glencarlyn, V G of Bluemont, N H of Claremont, J J of Courthouse, B L of Ashton Heights, J P of Crystal City, I S of Fairlington, and G W of Westover. Congrats! Many Thanks to our Frozen Victims Those who volunteered to be victims for last Saturday's CERT mock disaster brought new meaning to the expression CERTs on Ice! Not only did they each place two roles -- one in the triage/treatment station and another in the search and rescue station -- but they did so while trying to stave off frostbite! Many thanks to C N of Boulevard Manor, A H of Cherrydale, A D of Fairlington, and A G of Arlington Ridge for braving the cold and supporting the CERT program. Sure hope the feeling has returned to your limbs! And thanks also to Clare Halsey, Pete Zaremba, Bob Pye, Harry Brady and Mike Konoza of the ACFD for helping out with this frigid mini-exam. More Victims Needed We can still use a few volunteer victims for the February 28 CERT exam. If you haven't had the opportunity to help in this capacity yet, please consider doing so. Those who've been victims in the past will tell you it's a great way to refresh your own skills while also supporting the program. In fact, most of those who've done it before are on a back-up list to do it again, but we'd like to give first dibs to new victims. We especially need a few male volunteers for the 28th ... hint, hint! Free Red Cross Training As you know, we've allocated a large portion of last year's FEMA/VDEM (VA Dept. of Emergency Management) grant to cover the cost of Red Cross first aid/CPR/AED training for CERT members. Within the next week or so we should have all the enrollment details worked out. In the meantime, please don't contact the Red Cross to inquire about CERT classes, as they won't have answers. As soon as enrollment can begin, you'll be the first to know. CERT Basic Training ... Spread the Word Our 11th CERT class will begin this Thursday, January 22. If you know of any Arlington residents who may be interested in becoming CERT members, there may still be a few seats available. Two more classes for residents will be held before breaking for the summer. They'll start on Tuesday, February 10 and Thursday, February 19. Interested parties should enroll via the county website at www.co.arlington.va.us/ccc/classes.htm. Disaster Website One of the members of our current CERT class, G M of Bellevue Forest, shared the following website ... www.disasterhelp.gov/portal/jhtml/index,jhtml. According to G, it's "part of the President's Disaster Management Egov Initiative -- a larger initiative aimed at greatly enhancing Disaster Management on an interagency and intergovernmental basis." Check it out! While We're Sharing ... Another thoughtful CERT member, K f of Fairlington, passed along an article from Border and Transportation Security magazine she thought might be of interest. The article, which is about community policing and homeland security, mentions CERT teams as an important resource to law enforcement officials and first responders. The article is attached. Thanks, K! Consolidation of Two Neighborhood Teams Effective immediately, the Cardinal House and Lyon Village CERTs are joining forces and will be meeting as one big team. M H, team coordinator for Lyon Village, will continue in that role for the combined team. During last week's team meeting, the group tested themselves using the final exam included as part of the new online FEMA CERT refresher course. Sounds like good practice for all of us. Ballston/Ashton Heights/Lyon Park Cluster to Meet The CERT members from three adjacent neighborhoods -- Ashton Heights, Ballston and Lyon Park -- will begin meeting as a "cluster" team this week as a means of keeping things going until each neighborhood has enough members to field its own team. P L of Ashton Heights will serve as team coordinator for the cluster. Welcome to this new team! Educational Opportunities Many CERT members are on the lookout for opportunities to learn new skills that may be of help in a disaster. In addition to the classes offered by such organizations as the American Red Cross and FEMA, some of the retailers in the area also offer courses. For example, REI (Bailey's Crossroads) is offering a land navigation class (March 6-7; $85) and just finished a GPS class. For more information, go to www.rei.com and click on "stores and events". If you're aware of other learning opportunities that might be of interest/value to CERT members, let us know and we'll get out the word. CERT Supply Tip One of our required CERT supplies is a list of emergency phone numbers, including utilities. If you don't have that list already, a good place to start is the emergency preparedness numbers compiled by the Arlington County Civic Federation. Go to www.civfed.org/emercont.htm and print the page for your reference. The only thing you'll need to add is Captain Lindgren's number at the Office of Emergency Management (703-228-3567) and any other numbers important to your neighborhood. * * * * * Well, that's enough for now. Have a good week! Cynthia TEAM COORDINATORS: No need to forward; this has been sent to all CERT grads and current trainees.