Pacific Angel Philippines Mass Casualty Exercise Improves Emergency Response

26 August 2015

From Tech. Sgt. Aaron Oelrich

TAGBILIRAN, Philippines -- In 2013, a 7.2 magnitude earthquake devastated Bohol Province, Philippines, destroying bridges and turning buildings into piles of rubble. The damage was significant with numerous injuries and fatalities.

The province’s reaction to the disaster exhausted first response agencies including the Armed Forces of the Philippines, the Philippine National Police, the Telephone and Radio System Integrated Emergency Response, the Provincial Heath Care Unit and the City Heath Care Unit.

“After the earthquake, response agencies worked independently, there was no teamwork, making it chaotic and unorganized,” said Mark Sidney Galia, head of emergency management for the TaRSIER. “I was the one in charge in our operation center; I set priorities to the responses and dispatched the teams to their locations. The first few days, there was duplication of services between the response agencies.”

Following the disaster, members of the emergency response agencies evaluated their reaction to the disaster.

“As an emergency responder, the earthquake was a wakeup call,” Galia said. “We realized we have to prepare, we have to be ready and we have to practice. Before the earthquake, we had the training but there was no practice. But with the help of Pacific Angel and this mass casualty exercise, we have learned how to practice our emergency response together.”

The mass-casualty exercise was the culminating event of a five-day subject matter expert exchange between the U.S. Defense Institute for Medical Operations, the Armed Forces of the Philippines, the Philippine National Police, the TaRSIER, the PHCU and the CHCU.

The event was part of the greater Pacific Angel Philippines, an exercise that brings together U.S. service members and other partner nation military personnel to establish partnerships and build capacity.

This year, Pacific Angel Philippines brought together the U.S., the Philippines and four other Indo-Asia-Pacific partners and Philippine non-governmental organizations.

“This was the first time that all the response agencies from the local area have trained together,” said Capt. Faiz Taqi, a Defense Institute for Medical Operations team member from Joint Base San Antonio, Texas. “Each agency conducts its own training, but they have never had a combined training like this. It has been very important and very successful because the local agencies came together and were able to bring different ideas and experts and share with one another for the first time.”

Taqi was not the only one who felt the training was valuable.

“For the past five days, we learned the theory of what to do, we prepared how to respond and we put it into action,” Galia said. “Everyone had a great experience. We learned interoperability between the different agencies and are better prepared for the next earthquake or emergency.”

With a new-found level of communication and cooperation between the emergency response agencies, they all move forward with a greater understanding of one another.

Taqi said the U.S. and the local emergency response agencies can learn a lot from each other, and collectively, they can work together to improve their processes as well.

“Working together is not only bringing the two nations together, it is also increasing the inter-agency cooperation by training the internal agencies together for the first time during the Pacific Angel Philippines.”