Madison County, Alabama
Community Emergency Response Team (CERT)

CERT News!

CERT CLASSES

CERT classes are normally offered at the City of Huntsville Fire/Rescue Training Academy located at 3011 Sparkman Dr. NW

Updated December 7, 2009:

CERT class 26 is scheduled for January 5, 2010 - February 23, 2010 at the Madison Mission Seventh Day Adventist Church on Shelton Rd. in the city of Madison. The class will be held on Tuesdays 6:30 - 9:00 PM. Registration began on December 6, 2009 by calling the church's class coordinator at 842-7690. The class is limited to 30 participants.

Status Board for CERT in Madison County:

Numbers updated: December 7, 2009
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• CERT classes: 25 (No. 26 is scheduled)
• CERT graduates: 455

CERT Team Locations

1 •Crestwood Community Watch (Southwest Huntsville)
2 •Rocket City Rockcrawlers Offroad Club(countywide)
3 •Madison County Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service (RACES)(countywide)
4 •Mt. Charron Community Watch (Northwest Huntsville)
5 •Elton Circle community (Meridianville)
6 •Sweet Briar Hollow Community Watch (Madison)
7 •Huntsville Mobile Home Estates (Southwest Huntsville)
8 •Liberty Square community (Madison)
9 •Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Church - Sparkman Dr. (Northwest Huntsville) & Madison
10 •Farley Community Church - Bell Rd. (South Huntsville)
11 •Alabama State Defense Force, 1st Brigade
12 •Maysville Rd area in New Market
13 •Sanmina-SCI - South Huntsville
14 •Crisis Services of North Alabama - Huntsville
15 •US Space and Rocket Center - Huntsville
16 •Seventh Day Adventist Disaster Services
17 •Monrovia Community
18 •Beverly's Place Community Watch (Monrovia)
19 •Maysville Community
20 •Cave Spring Baptist Church - Owens Cross Roads
21 •Teledyne Brown Engineering - Huntsville
22 •SAIC Employees - Huntsville

Madison County CERT Association

Madison County CERT Association website
The Madison County CERT Association is the member ran organization that provides an interface between Emergency Management and the individual CERT teams. The website is maintained by volunteers in the CERT program.

What is CERT Anyway????

The Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) program helps train people to be better prepared to respond to emergency situations in their communities. When emergencies happen, CERT members can give critical support to first responders, provide immediate assistance to victims, and organize spontaneous volunteers at a disaster site. CERT members can also help with non-emergency projects that help improve the safety of the community.

The CERT course is taught in Madison County by a trained team of first responders who have completed a CERT Train-the-Trainer course conducted by instructors selected by the Alabama Emergency Management Agency. CERT training includes disaster preparedness, disaster fire suppression, basic disaster medical operations, and light search and rescue operations.

Target groups to receive CERT training include: Community Watch, emergency communications & transportation groups, local businesses, church groups, and any other community-based group that can respond as a localized team in their area during times of disaster.

Madison County CERT Instructors:

CERT instructors primarily come from one of our local emergency responder agencies such as: HEMSI (ambulance service), Huntsville Fire & Rescue, Madison Fire & Rescue, Emergency Management, and some individuals that have been in the CERT program for some time and volunteer as an instructor through VOAD.

Madison County's first CERT class graduated on November 20, 2003.

We want to thank this group for stepping up and volunteering for a program new to Madison County. The pilot class included the Crestwood Community Watch group, EMA's Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service Unit (RACES) members, and members of the Rocket City Rockcrawlers - a local 4 wheel drive club.

CERT Training (click each image for larger view)

Unit 1: Disaster Preparedness This is a presentation on hazards that face Madison County and steps that individuals can take to mitigate those hazards as well as having a disaster supply kit and disaster plan.

Unit 2: Fire Safety Students learn about fires, fire safety, and hazardous materials. Students then use a fire extinguisher to put out a small fire. Students are required to wear appropriate clothing and shoes on this night. Leather palmed work gloves and safety goggles are also required.

Unit 3: Disaster Medical Operations I Students learn about treating life threatening conditions, START triage system, and watch a video about START triage.

Unit 4: Disaster Medical Operations II Students learn about public health considerations, establishing treatment areas, head to toe assessments (including performing an actual assessment), and basic first aid procedures (including splinting/bandaging).

Unit 5: Light Search and Rescue Students learn about conducting a sizeup of the disaster scene, degrees of damage, basic search principles and techniques, and rescue operations. Use of cribbing material and prybar to lift heavy objects as well as methods of lifting and carrying victims will be covered.

Units 6&7: CERT Organization & Disaster Psychology Students learn about the incident command system (ICS), how to use ICS to organize themselves as a team, making decisions on a disaster scene, and how they fit in the ICS used by local responders. Students then are given a 30 minute presentation on team well being, survivor trauma, and interaction with the family of a deceased victim.

Unit 8: Terrorism Awareness Students learn about terrorist targets, weapons, indicators of a terrorism event, being prepared, as well as what CERTs should do in the aftermath of a terrorist incident.

Unit 9: Simulated Disaster Exercise A simulated disaster scenario, normally with "victims" is presented to the class. The students have the responsibility of organizing themselves and effectively take action to respond to and operate in the incident. After the exercise is complete, a short debriefing is held and graduation certificates are presented to those students that completed all portions of the course.

Links to CERT group sites (not maintained by EMA)

The Huntsville Community Watch Association is very supportive of CERT. Several neighborhoods have watch members who are CERT trained as well as Commmunity Watch Association Board members.

The Rocket City Rockcrawlers is a Huntsville based four wheel drive club. Several Rockcrawlers members have been trained in CERT and have the ability to provide transportation assets in remote areas. The RCRC is also a member of the Madison County Voluntary Organizations Active in Disasters (VOAD)

Other Citizen Corps Volunteer Activities:

Some activities associated with Volunteers in Police Service (VIPS) have been in place in Madison County for years. The Madison County Sheriff's Department has a volunteer Reserve Deputy program for adults and a Deputy Cadet Corps for those ages 16-20. Huntsville Police also has a youth program, the Ranger Corps. Seniors can also check with your local department to see if opportunities exist to volunteer.

Madison County is also fortunate enough to have community watch groups in place for a number of years now. The cities of Huntsville and Madison both have neighborhood watch organizations, as well as rural Madison County. To learn more about these groups, contact your local police department's community relations office or the Madison County Sheriff's Department.

Madison County Citizen Corps Council:

Madison County, including all municipalities within the county, are fortunate enough to have a strong community safety oriented committee already in place. The Madison County Emergency Planning Committee (MCEPC) brings together response agencies, government agencies, volunteer groups, and faith-based services in our county. Since all the key components of a Citizen Corps council are represented, the MCEPC was a logical choice to spearhead the local effort.

Through resolutions from local governments, the Chairman of the Madison County Emergency Planning Committee has the authority to appoint a subcommittee to serve as the Citizens Corps Council for all of Madison County.

Such a committee has been authorized by the MCEPC Chairman. Scott Worsham, an Emergency Management Officer with the Huntsville-Madison County Emergency Management Agency, was selected to chair the Citizen Corps subcommittee of the MCEPC. As such, his role is to serve as a point of contact, organizing membership on the Council, and coordination. Scott can be reached at (256)427-5130 or at scott.worsham@hsvcity.com if you request further information.

National Citizen Corps Council

The groups on the National Citizen Corps Council are from:

Law Enforcement

Emergency Medical and Public Health Services

Emergency Management

Volunteer

National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster
American Red Cross
National Safety Council
Points of Light Foundation and Volunteer Center National Network
Salvation Army
Church World Service
Civil Air Patrol

Intergovernmental Groups

Private Sector

U.S. Chamber of Commerce

U.S. Junior Chamber of Commerce (Jaycees)

American Public Works Association

Other Federal Partners

National Citizen Corps Website

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12/07/2009