Military forces from the Dominican Republic and the United States, along with 911 operators, police officers, paramedics, EMTs, firefighters, and other first responders, participated in the Humanitarian Assistance/Disaster Relief (HA) seminar. /DR) at the Emergency Operations Center (COE) in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, on December 1.
The seminar was part of the activities of the visit of the hospital ship of the US Navy USNS Comfort to the Dominican Republic. The ship, belonging to the US Naval Forces Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), is deployed in support of Continuing Promise (CP) 2022, a goodwill and humanitarian assistance mission that brings direct medical care, veterinary care expeditionary, and subject matter expert exchanges to five partner nations in the Caribbean, Central and South America.
“It is critical to strengthening and building lasting relationships and promise between the US and partner nations. It is a great honor and privilege to work side by side with the professionals from the different organizations, who are key disaster response personnel within the Dominican Republic,” said US Navy Lieutenant Commander Jennifer Groger , of Amphibious Squadron (PHIBRON) Four, HA/DR leader for the CP mission. “It helps build on the foundation and techniques that have already been established within the country.”
The HA/DR program included presentations on the capabilities of the USNS Comfort, the US Agency for International Development’s Office of Humanitarian Assistance, and an earthquake simulation exercise conducted by the Pacific Disaster Center. , among others. Simultaneously, other first responders attended a first aid course, which included medical evacuation and flight sessions with the US Army UH-60L Black Hawk helicopter, assigned to USNS Comfort.
“The participants are very committed. They are passionate about their work and their representation in civil society and how they would integrate. This exercise is important to the US and the Dominican Republic; so we want to practice these maneuvers before we actually do them,” said US Navy Rear Adm. Larry LeGree, deputy director of Joint Interagency Task Force South, who observed the tabletop exercise. “Continuing Promise shows the long-term success of the partnership with the Dominican Republic and demonstrates the long-term commitment to the future.”
During the HA/DR event, participants from both nations exchanged experiences and challenges of response actions to specific missions. In addition, they discussed the steps to follow in emergency response drills and the actions carried out during events such as the response to COVID-19.
US support in preparation
The Major General of the Army of the Dominican Republic (R) Juan Manuel Méndez García, director of the COE, spoke of the importance of AH/DR training for his organization. The COE coordinates all actions among the institutions of the National System for Prevention, Mitigation and Response to Disasters.
“This tabletop exercise is extremely important because it allows us to have a vision of what could happen. It is an emergency situation that can be simulated in the institutions and with our staff, to see our capabilities on the subject; it also includes communication, which is extremely important in an emergency issue,” said Maj. Gen. Mendez.
The director of the COE recalled that communication is the first thing that collapses in an emergency situation, and stressed the importance of coordination between emergency operations centers and having plans.
The May. Gen. Méndez said that the COE received technical advice from SOUTHCOM and other federal agencies, in the creation of its first contingency plan for earthquakes in 2009. A year later, in January 2010, after the earthquake in Haiti, the Dominican Republic and the COE served as a platform to support their neighbor in response to the emergency.
Thanks to the support of the US, he added, in addition to a plan for the hurricane season, they have a contingency plan for earthquakes, for forest fires and for meteorological events that produce emergency situations such as frontal systems.
Michael “Chris” Schaff, a member of the diplomatic team of Mobile Security Deployment (MSD), a specialized tactical unit of the US Department of State, was one of the experts in disaster response.
“If a natural or man-made disaster occurs, we have the ability to support or assist embassies, with recovery or rescues, and the interaction that would occur after an event,” Schaff said. “It’s a great opportunity for us to participate and share some of that knowledge. We try to show you some of the best practices across the many organizations that are involved here, so that you get the best training possible.”
José Cordero, an engineer from the Dominican National Office for Seismic Assessment and Vulnerability of Infrastructures and Buildings, ensures that all AH/DR events create awareness to provide an effective response to a disaster.
“We are in the path of hurricanes. For example, every year we have the cyclonic season and we have two seismic zones, one of high seismicity and one of medium seismicity. That is, there is not [ningún país en América] that it is not considered seismic, so we have a high risk of an event occurring very similar to the one that happened in Haiti in 2010, which in fact shows that the island (…) has seismic activity.
Cordero warned that some of the country’s infrastructure is built near seismic fault lines, and that the conditions in those places would probably be affected by strong tremors.
“We are not exempt from a disaster happening at any time, because nature is good and its actions cannot be defined, it cannot estimate how it can act, but it is unpredictable,” said Cordero. “But if we are prepared, we can mitigate the effects that it itself cannot generate on us. So, with this type of exercise, the community can know if we are really prepared”, concluded Cordero.