A Guide for Assessing Community Emergency Response Needs and Capabilities for Hazardous Materials Releases (2011)

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Three types of emergency response teams deal with hazmat: the traditional hazmat response from the public safety community, occupational/industrial manufacturing response, and environmental oil and hazardous substance response. This Guide uses a single framework to assess the capability for all response team types, allowing all resources to be considered equally in your planning process. The information provided in this chapter will enable you, as an emergency response planner, to assign a tier to each team. Team Definition/Organization The most commonly used term when referring to emergency responders is “team.” A team can mean different things to different jurisdictions, and a common, consistent framework is needed to measure capability. This Guide provides flexibility in how you define your response teams, allowing you to measure response for individual fire stations, entire departments, industry partners, multijurisdictional agreements, and so on. As an example, jurisdictions and providers may choose to share the financial and management burden of establishing, maintaining, and employing complex emergency response capabilities by integrating specific elements resident in multiple jurisdictions or providers into a strike team or task force, which can be task-organized, reinforced, and/or sustained depending upon the particular situation. In other words, you will measure the emergency response capability for the “teams” in your jurisdiction as you see fit. If you choose to use smaller units, such as individual fire stations, you may find that you need to combine the resources of several of these units to form a “team” with the response capability needed to respond to certain types of incidents. Terminology to Represent Emergency Response Capability To avoid confusion with other terms, such as “levels” or “ratings,” specific capabilities are defined in Response Capability Tiers beginning with a standard baseline of operations capabilities. NFPA Standard 472 (2008 Edition) defines Operations Level Responders as those “who respond to hazmat incidents for the purpose of implementing or supporting actions to protect nearby persons, the environment, or property from the effects of the release.” Operations Level Respon- ders are the core components of an effective response. Beyond the baseline capability, four Response Capability Tiers are defined that advance from Tier 1, the lowest capability, to Tier 4, the highest capability. The combination of technician- level responders determines whether a hazmat response team meets the requirements of a spe- cific tier as defined in the next section of this Guide. 11 C H A P T E R 2 Assessing Emergency Response Capability

As mentioned above, the capabilities of any resource are based upon how that resource is organized, trained, certified, equipped, exercised, evaluated, and sustained. The approach in this Guide is to assess capabilities against existing standards whenever possible. An analysis of existing resource typing initiatives by DHS/FEMA showed that: • Only some elements of public safety-based hazmat response had accepted, consensus-based definitions; and • These definitions applied to only high levels of capability and capacity that were above the established minimum standards in NFPA Standard 472 (2008 Edition) and 29 CFR 1910.120Q. The tier concept was used to define emergency response capabilities to ensure that all levels of response were addressed consistently. This approach is consistent with the FEMA typed resource definitions for the national level, but includes other elements such as casualty decontamination and the baseline level of response capability discussed earlier. In addition, the term tier is not used in other contexts to denote emergency response capability. However, class and/or level are used in other contexts. For example, jurisdictional classes and levels are used to classify the capabilities of jurisdictions and technical, operational, and supervisory levels are used for assessing emergency response performance. This Guide generally classifies environmental and occupational/industrial response teams in the baseline tier, but these teams should be assigned to a higher tier if they meet the corresponding specifications. The baseline tier would also be appropriate for traditional public safety hazmat response teams without technician-level training, certification, and supporting equipment. Appendix D contains more information on the development of the capability assessment process. For the purposes of this Guide, a fundamental assumption is that your jurisdiction has adopted the NIMS to facilitate the common exchange of information, services, and resources across juris- dictional boundaries. This NIMS component includes the standard planning and preparedness concepts in the Comprehensive Preparedness Guide 101 (FEMA 2009) as well as the adoption of the ICS, the Unified Command System (UCS), and the Multi-Agency Coordination System (MACS). This Guide recognizes that adoption of NIMS is not consistent across federal, state, tribal, and local governments, especially not at the local level, where federal funding streams, which carry with them the mandate for NIMS compliance, may not always drive the recommended changes in the specified time period. Defining Emergency Response Capability Tiers Table 2 identifies requirements for the emergency response capability tiers organized by different types of testing and response equipment, training, and sustainability. 12 A Guide for Assessing Community Emergency Response Needs and Capabilities for Hazardous Materials Releases Table 2. Hazmat response team capability tiers. Capability1 Tier Baseline 1 2 3 4 FEMA Resource Type (Equivalent) N/A N/A III II I Highest Team Certification2 (Operations or Technician) Ops Ops/ Tech Tech Tech Tech Field Testing3 Presumptive Identification – Chemical X X X X Presumptive Identification – Radiological X X X X Presumptive Identification – Biological X X Presumptive Identification – Spec. Chemicals6 O

(continued on next page) Intervention3 Dike, Dam, & Absorption Capability X X X Liquid Leak Intervention X Neutralize, Plug, & Patch Capability X Vapor Leak Intervention X Advanced Intervention Capabilities15 X X X X X X Capability1 Tier Baseline 1 2 3 4 FEMA Resource Type (Equivalent) N/A N/A III II I Air Monitoring3 Atmospheric Monitoring – Oxygen X X X X X Atmospheric Monitoring – Explosive Gas X X X X X Atmospheric Monitoring – CO X X X X X Atmospheric Monitoring – H2S X X X X X Atmospheric Monitoring – Flammable Diff.7 X X X Atmospheric Monitoring – Identify TIC8 X X Atmospheric Monitoring – Identify Conc.9 X Sampling3 Sampling – Solid X X Sampling – Liquid O X X X X Sampling – Air/Vapor O O X Radiation Monitoring3 Survey – Gamma X X Survey – Gamma & Beta X X X Survey – Gamma, Beta, & Alpha X Personal Dosimeters10 X X X X Protective Ensembles3 Liquid Splash-Protective CPC11 X X XX X Vapor-Protective CPC12 X Flash Fire Vapor-Protective CPC13 X Level C PPE14 X X X X X Level B PPE14 X X Level A PPE14 X X X X X Technical Reference3 Printed & Electronic X X X Dispersion Modeling with Map Overlays X X Special Capabilities3 Specialized Equipment Based upon Local Risk X X Heat Sensing Capability X Light Amplification Capability X Digital Imaging Documentation Capability X X X X X X X Table 2. (Continued). Assessing Emergency Response Capability 13

14 A Guide for Assessing Community Emergency Response Needs and Capabilities for Hazardous Materials Releases Training3 Awareness Level (NFPA 472) X X X Operations Level (NFPA 472) X X X Technician Level (NFPA 472) X X X X Specialist Level (NFPA 472) Incident Commander (NFPA 472) X X X Sustainability5 No Technician-level Entries X Less than 3 Entries within 24-Hour Period X 3 Entries within 24-Hour Period X 5 Entries within 24-Hour Period16 X 10 Entries within 24-Hour Period16 X Casualty Decon for 6-Hour Period17 X X X X X Casualty Decon for 12-Hour Period17 X X X X X Casualty Decon for 12+-Hour Period17 X Decontamination3 Team Decontamination – Known X X X Team Decontamination – Known & Unknown X Team Decontamination – Advanced X Casualty Decontamination (100 patients/hr) X X Casualty Decontamination (250 patients/hr) X Casualty Decontamination (500+ patients/hr) X Communications3 In-Suit, Wireless Voice X X X Wireless Data X Secure Wireless Voice X Staffing4 Hazmat Incident Commander X X X Hazmat Safety Officer X X X No Technician-level Capability X Minimum of 2 out, 2 in, 2 to Decon X X X X X X X More than 6 Hazmat Technicians X X X X X X X X X X X X Capability1 Tier Baseline 1 2 3 4 FEMA Resource Type (Equivalent) N/A N/A III II I Key X – Required minimum capability O – Optional capability Notes 1Capability Value – The value to insert into the risk equation for capability. The higher the value, the greater the capability mitigates the risk. 2Certification – Based upon 29 CFR 1910.120Q or NFPA Standard 472 (2008 Edition) as determined by jurisdiction. 3Metric – From FEMA (2005). Limitations include (1) focused solely on Hazmat Entry Team versus complete Hazmat Response Capability required to manage casualties as well as conduct testing, monitoring, and sampling and (2) focused on National-level resources exceeding minimum standards (hence the addition of Baseline and Tier 1 capability sets). Table 2. (Continued).

Assessing Emergency Response Capability 15 4Staffing – Additional details provided due to the increase of scope to include Operations-level units, casualty decontamination operations, & Hazmat Response Teams below the FEMA Type III resource definition. 5Sustainability – Additional capabilities listed to include Operations-level capability & sustained entries over FEMA 508-4 minimum. 6Specialized Chemicals – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 7Flammable Gas Differentiation – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 8Presumptive Identification of Toxic Industrial Chemicals (TIC) – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 9Presumptive Identification of Hazardous Material Concentration – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 10Personal Dosimeters – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 11Liquid Splash-Protective chemical protective clothing (CPC) – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 12Vapor-Protective CPC – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 13Flash Fire Vapor-Protective CPC – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 14Level A-C personal protective equipment (PPE) – As defined by 29 CFR 1910.120Q. 15Advanced Intervention Capabilities – As defined by FEMA 508-4 (20 July 2005). 16Entry Capabilities – Expanded beyond FEMA 508-4 minimum. 17Casualty Decontamination Capabilities – Additional metric due to expansion of scope from Hazmat Entry to Hazmat Response. Table 2. (Continued). Determining Your Teams’ Capability Tiers Step 1 Specify the tier level for each team or group of resources in your jurisdiction. Some groups might know their current tier level and, if so, there is no need to reevaluate it. If this is the case, enter the tier and proceed to the next step. If the tier level is not known, go through Table 2 row by row, and identify the tier at which the team or group performs for that row (as described in Step 2). You may wish to include mutual-aid organizations in your assessment of your emer- gency response capabilities. Step 2 Start with the Tier 4 column on the right and, moving leftward, assign the response team or group of resources to the first tier for which all the listed performance measures are met. For example, moving down the rows for Field Testing, a team that has Presumptive Identification capabilities for only chemicals and radiological materials (not biological) at most would be classified as a Tier 2 team. If you use the spreadsheet assessment tool, answer yes or no on each line. The results are auto- matically tabulated at the bottom of the table. The highest tier that meets all the assessment objectives for that tier is the tier level for the team. The tier level assigned in this step will be considered the current performance level for the assessment area. In Chapters 3 and 7, short- falls in these capabilities will be identified.