By Katrina Grant
The Pinelands Regional Community Emergency Response Team recently paired with the State Police Office of Emergency Management for training on the radio systems used in emergency situations. The state police reached out to the Pinelands CERT to have it take part in the training. The training was conducted at the Indian Mills Fire House in Shamong.
“The Pineland’s CERT, which is made up of members from Tabernacle, Shamong and Bass River, is a well-trained team,” William Lowe, emergency management coordinator said. “The Pineland’s CERT meets once a month to do trainings either in the field or in a class, so this was just one of our trainings. In this training, we went over the radio systems, to remind and refresh us in case of an emergency.”
The training was for a new radio system that the state police are using and making available to the Pineland’s CERT.
“Besides the new equipment, we already knew how to do a lot of this stuff that was in the training,” Lowe said. “What we went over in the training was communicated over the radio, set up an incident command post and performed a simulated search.”
“We simulated a missing person’s search,” Lowe said. “The Pineland’s CERT was involved with the search for that missing teenager as well.”
The Pineland’s CERT falls under the Office of Emergency management and works frequently with the state police for trainings and actual incidences.
“The state police are sort of like the lynchpin across the state for trainings,” Lowe said.
The Pineland’s CERT has 75 members, 50 of whom are active duty and 25 who are on standby.
“We teach individuals how to take care of themselves, their families and then the community,” Lowe said. “When we did the search for the missing teenager, 19 members showed up.”
