Islands Need HAZMAT Readiness, Experts Say . wtf ? something is on for shure when they use hazmat

something is on for shure !!!!



The Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands must be prepared to handle a hazardous materials incident without support for several days, one expert said last week

“We can’t just ask for help right next door and somebody can be here in a couple of hours. Even [the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency] will take three or four days to actually get teams to respond,” John Scott, president and lead instructor of All Hazard Management Professionals, told the Saipan Tribune.

The Northern Mariana Islands, a “commonwealth in political union with” the United States, lie roughly three-fourths of the way between Hawaii and the Philippines.

Scott and two other instructors last week provided training for 25 members of the commonwealth’s HAZMAT emergency response team. The intent is to help the responders prepare for a variety of potential incidents, Scott said.

“It could be a chemical accident. It could be a biological event like pandemic flu. It could be a weapon of mass destruction or terrorist incident,” he said.

The islands “don’t have the military here with already developed teams to perform this mission,” said assistant instructor J.D. Robinson. “So basically they are on their own to be self-sufficient if a matter like this will happen” (Ferdie de la Torre, Saipan Tribune, April 21 2008).