By Michelle Hunter
Times-Picayune (New Orleans)
Copyright 2007 The Times-Picayune Publishing Company
JEFFERSON, La. — Jefferson Parish firefighters took to the water Tuesday to showcase the latest additions to their hurricane preparedness plan: rescue boats.
Crews from the East Bank Consolidated Fire Department simulated several types of water rescue in Lake Pontchartrain with boats purchased through a $500,000 grant from the federal Department of Homeland Security, said Deano Bonano, the parish’s emergency operations chief.
Water rescues were long considered the responsibility of the Coast Guard or other aquatic agencies. But Hurricane Katrina’s flooding showed parish officials that firefighters could be trained and equipped to save residents trapped in deep or swift water. Because none of Jefferson’s fire departments had boats when Katrina hit, many firefighters commandeered vessels or used their own watercraft to save residents, Bonano said.
The grant let parish officials buy a 20-foot, flat-bottomed aluminum boat for each of Jefferson’s 19 fire departments, Bonano said.
The East Bank Consolidated Department, which covers Old Jefferson and most of Metairie, bought three more boats through its own budget: two flat-bottomed boats and an inflatable Zodiac, a 14-foot boat that maneuvers well in shallow water. The department also has formed a search and rescue team, spokesman George Rigamer said.
“We had a rescue squad prior to this that performed as well as they could with the equipment and training they had,” Rigamer said.
Now, however, the 25-firefighter crew is certified in swift-water rescue, urban search and rescue, rope use, extrications and searching in confined spaces and collapsed structures. Bonano said Jefferson’s other departments have sent firefighters for similar training.
On Tuesday, the crews demonstrated water rescues of conscious and unconscious victims, victims who were out of the reach of a boat, victims trapped on a simulated rooftop and victims trapped in a simulated attic. The team also used a smaller inflatable raft that is propelled by paddles. The curious-looking craft has no front or back, just U-shaped holes that rescuers can use to pull a victim aboard without capsizing the raft.
The boats have practical applications outside of storm-related rescues. Bonano said they can be used to save people in canals, the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain.
Still, if a worst-case scenario like a levee breech were to threaten again, Rigamer said, the department will be prepared.
“We learned so many lessons during the storm that this has evolved,” he said.