Hazmatters Indiana Hazmat Team Pools Resources as it Evolves When a clear need for better hazmat response arose nearly 45 years ago, fire chiefs in central Indiana’s Madison County got busy. It started with a 1977 rail incident that forced the evacuation of a nursing home and brough multiple mutual-aid agencies in. Two years later the county had a hazmat incident that closed all […] Written by Phil Ambrose February 29, 2024February 29, 2024
Hazmatters Combo Pa Hazmat Team Trains Often When one of the best-known nuclear incidents happened in your backyard, you take hazmat response seriously. Dauphin County, Pa. is home to Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station, which famously had a nuclear core meltdown in 1979. Historic hazmat incidents aside, the county has 558 square miles, a population of roughly 268,000 and Harrisburg as […] Written by Phil Ambrose February 22, 2024February 22, 2024
Hazmatters Hazmat Team Protects Mexico’s Third Largest City As the largest suburb of Mexico City, Ecatepec, has a population of 1.6 million and is the third most populous city behind Mexico City’s 16 boroughs and Tijuana. Migration from rural Mexico in the 1970s propelled its population growth until 2010; population growth has since leveled off. The city’s hazmat team, Ecatepec Rescue, was founded […] Written by Phil Ambrose January 10, 2024January 10, 2024
Hazmatters National Guard WMD, Hazmat Unit ‘Best Assignment’ Across the United States, the Department of Defense through the National Guard operates 57 Weapons of Mass Destruction Civil Support Teams. There is one WMD CST for each state and territory, with Florida, California and New York each having two teams. Each team has 22 members who are trained to at least the hazmat tech […] Written by Phil Ambrose December 28, 2023December 28, 2023
Hazmatters Calif Hazmat Team Born on the Rails California’s northern-most Type 1 Hazmat Team makes its home in Roseville. While the fire department dates back to 1907, the hazmat team didn’t come into existence until 1995. The department needed the team because the city had the largest rail classification yard on the west coast. Southern Pacific had a number of accidental releases, which […] Written by Phil Ambrose December 22, 2023December 22, 2023
Hazmatters Wash. Company Blends In-Person, Online Hazmat Training More than 10 years ago, a small group of hazmat professionals saw a training gap in the industry. Looking at agencies that lack continuing training, they felt the need to provide simple, easy-to-use and entertaining lessons to keep responders safe on events and compliant with the regulations. That was the impetus behind starting PHRT Instruction, […] Written by Phil Ambrose September 7, 2023September 18, 2023
Hazmatters Slovakian Bootstrap Hazmat Survival Team Educating the Public Based in Slovakia, this two-person operation kicked off nearly five years ago with the mission of helping civilians learn to survive a CBRN incident. The project aims to teach civilians the basic principles of modern century personal protection. This consists of handling protective equipment, creating make-shift protective means in times of distress and understanding potential […] Written by Phil Ambrose August 24, 2023August 24, 2023
Hazmatters S. Florida Hazmat Team Covers Huge Mutual-Aid Area Nestled between Miami and Fort Lauderdale is the city of Hollywood, Fla. The city, and it’s fire department, started off small. But that has all changed. Hollywood Fire Rescue was formed in 1924 with 19 men and two pieces of fire apparatus. Twenty years later, at the end of World War II, the city’s population […] Written by Phil Ambrose June 29, 2023August 21, 2023
Hazmatters Training Kentucky Volunteer Hazmat Team Covers 8 Counties In the fire service, volunteers have a history of being resourceful. With funding, staffing and training difficult to procure, being resourceful has been a matter of survival. The same holds true for volunteer-based hazmat teams. And nowhere is that more evident than in the Oldham County, Ky., which sits in the north central part of […] Written by Phil Ambrose June 15, 2023June 15, 2023