WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah—
It's a tough task to tackle: firefighters preparing for the worst. When disaster strikes, local agencies want to be ready. West Valley City's Battallion Chief, Bob Fitzgerald says, "These guys have the ability to figure out how to do things, how to get collapsed structures up, and how to get into, tiny, tiny voids to find victims."The Urban Search and Rescue task force or USAR is made up of eight Salt Lake Valley fire departments with a mission to save lives. They'll spend the next 24 hours training on ropes, crawling into confined spaces and digging trenches in order to be prepared in case of a natural disaster.
"It's not easy training," said Fitzgerald. "Some of it is a lot of fun. You do the rope rescue. You dangle and everything. When you have to cut through 36 inches of void, that training can get a little arduous and hard."
Utah is peppered with fault lines. The state is prone to earthquakes. It's also known for severe weather storms. "You really can't predict what's going to happen," says Fitzgerald. In 1999, a tornado hit Salt Lake City. Nearly 200 million dollars in damage was left behind. Buildings collapsed, homes were destroyed, a life lost and dozens were injured. The Metro Fire Agency is putting its team to the test, hoping USAR will one day be ready to deal with devastation, without heavily relying on federal resources Battallion Chief Fitzgerald believes, "We'll be easier deployed, quicker to deployment and we don't have to be asked by the federal government to be deployed. The main reason was to back each other up here in the valley in case of an earthquake, or the windstorms or the like the tornado that we had several years ago."
Side note: USAR is the first team of its kind in Utah. The Metro Fire Agency claims the state-funded USAR task force won't add any extra cost.
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