The Office of Civil Defense (OCD) said Wednesday, Feb. 5, that its personnel conducted a five-day training exchange with counterparts from Canada to enhance their interoperability during search and rescue operations.
Personnel of the OCD Rapid Deployment Team (RDT) and Canadian Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) were equipped with essential skills in areas such as collapsed structure search and rescue, water search and rescue, and medical emergency management during the training held from January 27 to 31.
The Canadian DART also shared valuable insights to the OCD from wildfire deployments, including their readiness to help the Philippines in case of forest fire incidents in the future.
Earlier this month, the OCD responded to a grass fire in Carasi, Ilocos Norte which razed 287 hectares of land.
For its part, the OCD RDT’s demonstrated the capabilities of its water filtration systems, which are crucial for ensuring the supply of potable water during times of disasters.
“We are very thankful to our Canadian counterpart for providing us some important knowledge about preventing more any future disasters after wildfires, great floods, and landslides caused by typhoons, among others,” OCD Administrator, Undersecretary Ariel Nepomuceno said.
“The five-day training exchange from January 27 to 31 is beneficial to our response and rescue team,” he added. “By enhancing our technical [knowledge], it gives us more time to save lives during [times] of calamities and disasters.”
The OCD said the training was part of the country’s efforts to achieve international certification under the International Search and Rescue Group (INSARAG).
According to Nepomuceno, there has been a notable improvement in the level of disaster preparedness among Filipinos but there is more that needs to be done to build a resilient Philippines.
“We have seen improvements, specifically on the use of scientific data with Hazard Hunter or Geohazard maps,” Nepomuceno stated, referring to the tools available for hazard assessment.
These tools are crucial for enabling people to make informed decisions in preparing for or mitigating disasters, especially given that around 20 typhoons visit the country annually, alongside the risk of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.
“With these platforms, the people already know the hazards in their specified locations. We are equipping them with knowledge on the dangers they are facing — whether these are flood-prone, landslide-prone, and the like,” he explained.
Despite this, the OCD chief said some residents still refuse to evacuate their communities especially when there is a typhoon, earthquake, or volcanic eruption despite multiple warnings. He attributed this to a "complacent mindset" among the Filipinos.
“The government is relentless in the issuance of warnings for disasters, but some Filipinos have the tendency to ignore these alerts. Because of this, we are continuously finding ways to make our warnings more understandable, more creative, and more relevant to the people,” he said. “In fact, for typhoons, we give warnings as early as three days before the onset of the cyclone.”
He vowed to continue collaborating with the media to provide timely and adequate warnings for disasters, and emphasized the importance of investing in the youth, whose mindsets are "easier to mold."