When the Big One comes, what will you do? How will you help people around you? The San Francisco Fire Department wants you to be prepared.
The department’s Neighborhood Emergency Response Team, or NERT, has trained residents to be helpful in the event of a disaster since 1990. And since the fires in Southern California began, interest has skyrocketed.
“Instead of 10 calls a day, I’m fielding about 100 calls a day,” Capt. Brandon Tom, who leads the NERT program, said. Another factor driving the surge in interest, he added, was Mayor Daniel Lurie’s mention of the program in his inauguration speech.
At a NERT class Wednesday evening, Capt. Norm Caba taught about 25 students how to open obstructed airways, stop bleeding, and treat shock in an emergency setting. If a major earthquake strikes, Caba explained, there will be more injured people than professional emergency responders can treat. That’s where trained civilians can help.
“In these massive disaster situations, there is no 911,” said Noe Valley attorney Mark Seifert, who attended the training. “No one is coming to help.”
Seifert was evacuated from the Oakland Hills during the Tunnel fire in 1991, when he was a student at UC Berkeley. This is his second time going through NERT training. The L.A. fires ignited on his first day of class, underscoring the importance of the course.
“It was definitely a reminder that we’re in the right spot,” said Michelle Foley, who works at the San Mateo library.
Students practiced opening one another’s airways and making tourniquets out of scraps of cloth. Students of all ages seemed to become friendly with their classmates.
In addition to the training, NERT offers leaflets with information on what to pack in a “home preparedness kit” and how to create a personal disaster plan.
Tom said that in a perfect world, every resident would enroll in NERT training, but even 5% of San Franciscans would make a huge difference. There are about 12,000 active graduates, Tom said — the most of any Bay Area city but not as many as the department would like. San Francisco has been relatively lucky with fire in recent years, but a large-scale disaster like L.A.’s is a possibility.
“It can happen,” Tom said. “We can have winds get that high.”
There’s a separate program specifically for Spanish-speaking residents, Listos (“ready”). Lt. Mariano Elias, who teaches Listos courses, said it’s a condensed version of NERT, administered through the SFPD’s Spanish-speaking Bomberos program.
Firefighters don’t wear uniforms for the trainings so as not to spook participants who may be wary of law enforcement, Elias said. The Bomberos provide food and encourage trainees to bring their families.
