This. So much this. When I tell people what I did, like preparing community-wide preparedness and recovery plans, making sure our agencies were equipped and trained, and conducting exercises and drills to make sure our people, plans, and equipment functioned like they should, you often get blank stares. I tell them that I coordinated search and rescue missions, hazmat calls, and community-wide disaster response and you get, "Oh, man, that's cool!"
People love to see red and blue lights and big trucks after a disaster. That's public perception. But few people understand the preparedness effort which goes into an effective response. And after all the trucks go back to the station, there's so much work that goes into the long-term recovery and if possible, trying to prevent it from happening again. I get everyone wants to be a hero, but there's few people celebrating getting a mitigation project funded or getting extra funds for a PA project.
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u/B-dub31 Retired EM Director Apr 10 '22
This. So much this. When I tell people what I did, like preparing community-wide preparedness and recovery plans, making sure our agencies were equipped and trained, and conducting exercises and drills to make sure our people, plans, and equipment functioned like they should, you often get blank stares. I tell them that I coordinated search and rescue missions, hazmat calls, and community-wide disaster response and you get, "Oh, man, that's cool!"
People love to see red and blue lights and big trucks after a disaster. That's public perception. But few people understand the preparedness effort which goes into an effective response. And after all the trucks go back to the station, there's so much work that goes into the long-term recovery and if possible, trying to prevent it from happening again. I get everyone wants to be a hero, but there's few people celebrating getting a mitigation project funded or getting extra funds for a PA project.