Essay: Gulfport, Mississippi

The first deployment of the National Capitol Regions Incident Management Team, (NCR-IMT) occurred Thursday, September 15, 2005. It's mission is to provide Incident Management during any all-hazard disaster. This would be its first deployment. This thoroughly schooled NCR-IMT team was organized as a result of September 11, 2001.

A request was made by the National Emergency Management Association (NEMA) The Emergency Management Assistance Compact request was to provide Hurricane Katrina recovery and mutual-aid assistance to the devastated Gulfport, Mississippi coastal region.

The NCR-IMT team was mobilized within four hours at the Fairfax County Fire & Rescue Training Academy, where we were checked in and were given a briefing of our mission to help in the recovery efforts in Mississippi. With our go-bags and support equipment, we boarded buses and other Fire & Rescue support vehicles for our 23 hour trip to the devastated Gulf Coast.

When we arrived Friday evening at the 32story Imperial Palace Hotel Casino in Biloxi, MS. , we were not prepared for the magnitude and the coastal damage, we were going to see as we entered the devastated area surrounding area of the hotel. It was on the scale of a Tsunami, up to a half mile inland along the entire Mississippi coast line, 90% destroyed, over 200 billion in damages.

The areas surrounding the facility were totally devastated by the CAT 5 storm. The first three floors of the hotel were washed out by the storm surge of 30 feet. The hotel was hanging on by a string. There was no hot water, and the electrical power was off and on. It was like working under primitive and demanding circumstances, nothing like we experience routinely back home. Hand washing, electric, fresh food, personal hygiene facilities and water were not taken for granted. We were totally grateful for the owner of the hotel for doing what was a miracle for the conditions at hand.

FEMA has leased the hotel space above the third floor to serve as a command post for FEMA, Mississippi Emergency Management and all the other supporting agencies during the recovery. Usable space was very critical in such conditions.

Six days earlier we had sent six of our personnel to Gulfport as an overhead team to gather information from the Tallahassee, FL. IMT host team we were going to relieve. They were totally exhausted and ready to return home.

Our overhead team was glad to see us arrive at the hotel Friday evening, because of the work that needed to be done. We had shadowed the Tallahassee team and were ready to take over the mission. The continuity of operations plan (COOP) was well coordinated between our two teams. We had "Boots on the Ground" within 24hrs of our arrival. We were making a difference in our short time of setting up our Command Post.

On this mission, for the first time we had gathered fire & rescue personnel from Montgomery County, Frederick, Prince George's County, District of Columbia, Fairfax County, Alexandria City, Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority, Prince William County and Loudon County, Virginia to assist the NCR-IMT Team with manpower and logistical support. Fairfax County Fire & Rescue also provide Information Technology support personnel on the mission which proved to be very crucial to our communications and computer needs. This combined group effort was a necessary function for a recovery mission and was a lesson learned for us. It does not hurt to bring extra help, there is plenty to do for those in need.

We were able to have many positive accomplishments during our deployment. We were able to fully integrate with the Tallahassee, Fl. IMT team and with the Harrison County Emergency Operations Command Post in Gulfport, MS.

Our Command Post was located in a metal building of the Gulfport Beach Department which was located in the Sand Beach, section of Gulfport. It became home during our operations. We provided the Planning for the Harrison County Emergency Operating Center.

The Gulfport Tourism office had their facility totally destroyed and were assigned to assist our team with administrative help, which was very important in the planning for the day to day recovery efforts. Our Mission was to staff Twenty Points of Distribution (POD's) with Food, Water and ICE each day. We staffed a Logistics Staging Area (LSA) outside the devastated area which was a 24-7 operation for delivery of supplies to our Points of /distribution each day. Our day started with a briefing of the Incident Action Plan for the day. Our members worked very hard and with compassion those coming for supplies daily, sometimes by themselves for a community that was still feeling the effects of the devastation and loss for everything that was important in their lives.

The Team was also able to help the community on several days by helping replace roofs on houses and replacing damaged drywall and insulation in the Pass Christine Elementary School, so it could open the following week. There was no rest for our personnel, we had to reassign sometimes repeatedly to different jobs due to shifting needs of very dynamic circumstances occurring in the recovery area along the coast.

During our mission we were faced with a new storm which had reached a CAT 5, her name was Hurricane Rita. "What were the chances of two CAT 5 Hurricanes in two weeks time"? The folks at the Sand Beach Command Post and at the Harrison County EOC were not ready to receive another hit. Emotions were very high, some just cried with thought of another storm like Katrina. Our jobs also became that of Crisis Counselors for our Mississippi co-workers. As the storm approached it took a westerly path and just brushed the coast with some storm surge and tropical rain. Our NCR Firefighters and the IMT Team were ready to perform in an operations mode for Hurricane Rita with out a hitch. Our planning had paid off. This was an example of the shifting needs while being deployed in an already devastated area. We call it an Incident within and Incident, something we train for as an Incident Management Team for the National Capitol Region.

Demobilization was a bitter sweet event. It was time to return to the National Capitol Region. We had made new friends and worked with a very dedicated team of the Harrison County, Mississippi Emergency Management Center, U. S. Coast , U.S. Navy See Bees, Gulfport Department of Tourism, American Red Cross, FEMA, Beach Department, County Executive and the local Mayors of Harrison County, MS.

There was so much more to be done. We had helped thousands of Mississippi citizens with supplies and compassion for their situation. We would leave Gulfport with our tired heads high and with memories that will be locked in our minds for ever. The National Capital Region can be proud of the personnel and resources that responded last September. The NCR-IMT left to help storm victims, not for gain or prestige, fully dedicated to their task. The 36 members of the NCR Hurricane Katrina Recovery team arrived home on morning of October 2, 2005.

The Colonel Joe Spraggins, Director of the Harrison County Emergency Operating Center best summed it up with a motto he had on a big poster in the EOC Situation Briefing room that read.

"Hurricane Katrina was an Act of Mother Nature. What we are doing is an Act of God"

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