The Burnaby Urban Search and Rescue team has arrived in Venezuela to assist in the search for survivors, almost a week after two massive quakes rocked the country.
Deputy Fire Chief Ian Hetherington, who is a member of the team, is working as their liaison here at home. He tells 1130 NewsRadio their crews started searching around 10 p.m. PST Sunday north of Caracas’ Simon Bolivar Airport.
“There’s a coastal part of the city there that has a lot of concrete multi-story buildings that have collapsed,” he said.
“They’re getting a lot of reports that there’s still people alive and trapped inside the buildings.”
The team consists of seven members and two specially trained dogs. Hetherington says crews are expected to be kept busy for a while.
“From on the ground, there’s still viable rescues to be done for the next foreseeable number of days,” he said.
“[Some of the people trapped] are getting access to communications, so that would be cell phones, making everyone aware where they’re trapped.
The team is working with task force crews from the United States, as well as local military and government in Venezuela, he says.
Hetherington says members have experience working after mass disasters, but differing conditions mean each case is unique. In this situation, crews target their searches based, in large part, on the canine team’s alerts.
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“The dogs are trained to find victims in rubble, so you focus on that. You have search capabilities, either technical search capabilities, and you just focus on that,” he said.
“When you get assigned a building or an area, you just focus on your task, and that’s it. You’re very much on the ground doing your task, and then if your dog discovers something, you pass that up through the chain of command and then start affecting a rescue.”
The team is expected to remain in the area until July 2 or 3, he says, but that may be extended.
“It would be normally about seven days, possibly longer depending on the conditions,” he said.
“It’s always difficult getting in and also a challenge getting out at times, because every flight is booked for other purposes in support for the overarching disaster. So sometimes that’s a challenge.”
Hetherington says Burnaby Urban Search and Rescue is a nonprofit group made up of first responders.
“We do have partnerships with other agencies, including the City of Burnaby, which supports the team with regards to equipment, and also the Burnaby Fire Department….there are donations that are extremely valuable and needed to do this type of work.”
Venezuela was hit with devastating back-to-back earthquakes last week, killing a reported 1,450 as of Monday morning and destroying buildings and essential infrastructure around the country.
Challenges continue Monday morning after a strong aftershock hit early in the morning, which the U.S. Geological Survey measured at 4.6 on the Richter scale.
— With files from Dean Recksiedler and The Associated Press