Firewhirl: Phoenix USAR Team Suspended Archives

Phoenix USAR Team Suspended

From azcentral.com (via FireFightingNews.com):

The Phoenix Fire Department's Urban Search and Rescue team has been suspended from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for deploying armed police officers to protect firefighters in violation of the agency's rules.

As a result, Phoenix officials now are threatening to refuse some of the most dangerous deployments in the future or possibly even pull out of the federal agency altogether, unless the rules are changed to allow teams to bring their own security, even if that means police with guns.

I know very little about USAR teams so its a little difficult to comment on this. From my perspective, FEMA either needs to allow USAR teams to bring their own police protection personnel, or provide the personnel to the teams. They can't expect the USAR teams to deploy with no protection.

I'm sure this will take some time to sort out and I'll try to stay on top of new developments and post them.

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