YOKOTA AIR BASE, Japan -- In light of an emergency taking place, one center opens up for Airmen to coordinate information and resources to support the installation’s actions before, during and after an incident.

Airmen from the 374th Civil Engineer Squadron fire department and emergency management worked with members of the 374th Aerospace Medicine Squadron bioenvironmental engineering flight to complete in-house Emergency Operations Center training geared towards chemical attacks at Yokota Air Base, Japan, March 24, 2017.

“Since we both play a big part in the emergency operations center, it’s important for us to know what each other’s mission is and see how everything works,” said Airman 1st Class Spencer Patton, 374 CES emergency management journeyman. “This training helped us have a better working relationship and knowledge of what our counterparts do and has helped set the ground work towards future training scenarios.”

The training consisted of bioenvironmental members demonstrating some of their chemical detection capabilities that emergency management doesn’t have while going over their chemical attack references and what their mission in the EOC is geared towards.

Emergency management Airmen demonstrated how to use their Joint Chemical Agent Detector, EM’s capabilities during a chemical attack and what the EOC is and how personnel provide information and resources to support incident management during emergency operations.

The fire department provided all of the Airmen with self-contained breathing apparatus refresher training. The briefing entailed how to properly put together the SCBA, inspect the piece of equipment and how to use it.

“We learned from a previous training scenario that we are not reaching our goals as effectively as possible,” said Airman 1st Class Natalie Gaston, 374th Aerospace Medicine Squadron bioenvironmental engineer technician. “This joint training has tremendously helped us exchange information and processes to become more efficient at completing tasks and scenarios.”

Each squadron left the training with a better working relationship and increased knowledge of their emergency operation center counterparts.

“We are the primary responders to chemical base emergencies on base, so this was beneficial for us to become more knowledgeable about each other’s capabilities and how we can assist each other during potential scenarios,” Gaston said.