World Conference on Disaster Management

Call for papers for the 20th World Conference on Disaster Management (WCDM) closes at midnight (EST) on December 6th.

To submit go to: http://www.wcdm.org/Toronto/call-for-papers.html

Inside the mind of a female suicide bomber

An increasing number of female jihadis are being recruited and trained to blow themselves up in the name of Islam. Alissa J Rubin visits an Iraqi jail to find out what makes young women turn themselves into killing machines Alissa J Rubin The Observer, Sunday 22 November 2009

Ranya in Baquba jail, where she shared a cell with fellow would-be suicide bomber Baida Abdul Karim al-Shammari. Photograph: Michael Kamber In Baquba, the Iraqi police detective flipped pointlessly through a file on his desk; the daylight was too faint to read by and the electricity had long since gone off. He seemed about to say something. Then a bomb exploded a few blocks away, and his office shook. The radios on his desk crackled. He nodded to his colleagues, and they ran into the hall to join police officers already rushing to the site of the explosion. As he rose to follow them, the detective - Major Hosham al-Tamimi, then director of the National Investigation and Information Bureau - indicated the file before him. "You will like Baida," he said. It was a curious thing to say about someone who sought to kill people like him and like me. He added, almost pensively: "I like Baida. She is honest."

Baida is one of 16 female would-be suicide-bomber suspects or accomplices who have been captured by the police in Diyala province since the beginning of 2008; almost as many have blown themselves up. When I first met Baida in February, she had already been in jail more than two months. She was in the same cell as another would-be suicide bomber, Ranya, who was 15 when she was caught on her way to a bombing, her vest already strapped on. Ranya's mother was also in the jail because she was believed to be connected to those involved in trying to organize Ranya's death.

Nowhere, it seems, have more women blown themselves up in so short a time as in Iraq, where there have been some 60 suicide bombings attempted or carried out by women, the majority of them in 2007 and 2008 - the numbers, for men as well as women, are lower this year, though the attacks continue. It is difficult to learn much about suicide bombers since there is rarely anything left of them.

Each woman's story is unique, but their journeys to jihad do have things in common. Many have lost close male relatives. Baida and Ranya lost fathers and brothers. Many of the women live in isolated communities dominated by extremists, where radical understandings of Islam are the norm. In such places, women are often powerless to control much about their lives; they cannot choose whom they marry, how many children to have or whether they can go to school beyond the primary years. Becoming a suicide bomber is a choice of sorts that gives some women a sense of being special, with a distinguished destiny. But Hosham urged me not to generalise: "All the cases are different. Some are old; some are young; some are just criminals; some are believers. They have different reasons."

The rise in the number of female suicide bombers in Iraq coincided with the expanding ability of the security forces to defeat bombers who were men. When, in 2006 and 2007, American and Iraqi forces began to use concrete barriers to protect government buildings, markets and other gathering places from car bombs, the insurgents turned to women, who could use to advantage their traditional dress: a voluminous, floor-length black abaya. Arab notions of modesty make it unthinkable that the police or guards would search women. Gradually the police learned to look for telltale signs, Hosham told me. Women often wear double abayas to hide their suicide vests. And they apply heavy make-up because they believe they are going to heaven and want to look their best. Last September, the Iraqi government completed training for 27 policewomen in Diyala. The effort came too late to save at least 130 people and probably more who have died in the province in suicide bombings carried out by women. Hosham was right. I liked Baida immediately. She had an open face and pale skin, a medium build and an unassuming manner. Her black veil was simple. A few strands of light brown hair strayed out, suggesting that, while conservative, she was not rigid. She seemed educated and told her story in a straightforward way.

She began in a soft voice: "My name is Baida Abdul Karim al-Shammari, and I am from New Baquba near the general hospital. I am one of eight children; five were killed. The police raided our home. It was a half- hour before dawn during Ramadan. The Americans were with them." She added with a touch of pride: "My brothers were mujahideen. They made IEDs." Mujahideen means holy fighters, and in the context of Iraq, they are fighters against the infidels, the Americans. IEDs are improvised explosive devices. She told me she helped make such devices, going to the market to buy wire and other bomb parts and working at putting bombs together. Men are routinely paid for such work; women are paid, too, but less. Baida was proud to be a volunteer. "I knew we were fighting against the Americans, and they are the occupation," she told me. "We are doing it for God's sake. We are doing it as jihad." When Baida was 17 her mother died, and a few months later, at her father's behest, Baida married. Almost immediately she knew she had made a mistake. A week after her wedding, according to Baida, her husband threw a cup of cream at her head; soon beatings became regular. She smiled sweetly and shrugged: "His hand got used to beating me."

For Baida, as for many Iraqi suicide bombers, violent insurgency was the family business. It was shortly after the American invasion that her brothers began to manufacture IEDs. One was killed when his handiwork exploded as he was concealing it. She had cousins who were also insurgents. While they were paid for their work, she said, she was herself motivated mainly by revenge. Later it would be revenge for the deaths of her father and four brothers in what she said was a joint American-Iraqi raid on their home, but at first it was more general. She told me she watched the Americans shoot a neighbour in 2005, and she replayed the image over and over in her mind: "I saw him running toward them, and then they shot him in the neck. I still see him. I still remember how he fell when the Americans shot him, and I saw him clawing on the ground in the dust before his soul left his body. After that I began to help with making the improvised explosive devices."

Executing a successful suicide bombing is rarely a lone act. It requires preparing a suicide vest, teaching the would-be bomber how to use it, and planning the mission. It means in some cases setting up a camera nearby so that the event can be filmed. For women, who rarely drive in Iraq, it would be impossible to get to the bomb site without assistance. Most of the women who blew themselves up were supported and trained by a network of extremists - often family members already active in the insurgency.

After her brothers and father were killed, Baida began to work with some of her cousins; they were also fighters and even more radical Islamists than her brothers. One of them died in a suicide attack, but not before introducing her to a group, run from Syria, that was connected to the Islamic State of Iraq - an umbrella organisation of insurgency groups. A goal of the group was to prepare men and women for suicide missions. "Maybe I can introduce you to them," she said warmly. "You could go meet them since they are free."

Baida initially did not plan to become a suicide bomber. Her cell members announced their readiness for a suicide mission in front of the group, making a public commitment, signalling that they had embraced the idea of a certain kind of death that would bring membership in a holy community. The group dynamic seemed designed to make participants feel as if they were freely choosing their destiny. That sense of freedom was an important component of their metamorphosis into suicide bombers. It was certainly important to Baida, who felt she controlled little in her life, to feel in control of her death. When I brought up the reality that the vast majority of suicide bombings in Iraq kill ordinary Iraqis, she would only say that she thought killing Iraqis was haram, or forbidden.

"We had meetings of 11 people; some came to the meeting with their faces covered,"Baida told me. "There were three women in the group. You could choose whether you wanted to do it. They wanted me to wear the explosive belt against the police, but I refused. I said: 'I will not do it against Iraqis.' I said: 'If I do it against the police I will go to hell because the police are Muslims. But if I do it against the Americans then I will go to heaven."

A few weeks later, when I met Baida again, she tried to explain to me the line dividing when it is halal (permitted) to kill a person and when it is forbidden. She said she followed the rules of her group, but her cousins had different rules: they would kill anybody. Was there a difference, I wondered, between killing American soldiers and killing American civilians, like reconstruction workers? No, she said: "I am willing to explode them, even civilians, because they are invaders and blasphemers and Jewish. I will explode them first because they are Jewish and because they feel free to take our lands." My interpreter asked where she stood: was it halal to kill her? "We consider you a spy, working with them," Baida said. Her choice of suicide was not entirely hers to make. The suicide vests given to participants were fitted with remote detonators so that someone else could explode the would-be bomber if she somehow failed to do it herself. This was a relatively new aspect of suicide bombing in Iraq. A second person, with a second detonator, would go on the mission to ensure against changes of heart. "One day this woman, Shaima, said: 'I am ready.' I saw Shaima when they put the vest on her. It was very heavy. With Shaima, they exploded her; she did not explode herself. There were five or six killed."

By the time I met Baida she was eager to get on with her mission, waiting for the day when she would be released from jail and be able to pick up her vest, which she said was being kept for her. (She has yet to be charged with any crime.) She appeared to have let go of most earthly ties. A mother of two boys and a girl, all under eight, she had not seen them since her arrest last year. When I asked if they missed her, she said, almost airily: "Allah will take care of them."

"As soon as I get out I will explode myself against the invaders," she told me. Before we left, I asked when it would be convenient to come and see her again. She said she was being moved soon to a psychiatric hospital in Baghdad, and she was afraid. I asked how we could get in touch. It turned out that she had smuggled a mobile phone into the jail, and kept the sim card hidden in her underwear. Once the phone itself was discovered - she had hidden it in a ceiling-light fixture - and confiscated, but she had somehow got access to another phone. "They don't know," she said softly, nodding at the policemen in the room, who were staring at a music video. I felt a wave of unease. She was not a beginner.

Ranya, like Baida, was from an insurgent family. There was her aunt Wijdan, who police say was a recruiter of women; her father, who the police believed was involved in making bombs for the insurgency; and a brother who was abducted and may also have been involved. A year after Ranya's father was kidnapped and killed by a Shiite militia, her mother acquiesced to Ranya's marriage in 2007 to a minor figure in the Islamic State of Iraq.

Less than a year after she was married, Ranya's husband brought her to a house in Baquba where two women he described as cousins outfitted her with a suicide vest: "They gave me something to eat and something to drink; it had a nice smell," she recalled. "Then they put the explosive belt on me, those two girls did. I remember there were red wires, but I didn't know what was inside it. They put it over my head." Baida later told me that, from her own conversations in jail with Ranya, it was clear that she knew exactly what she was doing and was proud of it.

After Ranya was outfitted with the vest, a woman in the house, Um Fatima, took her shopping. They went to one of Baquba's bazaars, and as Um Fatima looked at pots and pans Ranya drifted off. "There was a moment, only a moment, when Ranya felt afraid of death," Hosham said. Ranya told me she just wanted to see her mother. You can imagine that moment: realising that your life might be about to end and you aren't ready. When Um Fatima saw that she had lost Ranya, she fled the market, throwing away the remote detonator she was planning to use if Ranya failed to explode herself. The police later found the detonator.

Meanwhile Ranya, wearing her suicide vest, unsure where she was going, wandered Baquba's back alleys. As she approached a checkpoint manned by members of the Awakening, the American-backed neighbourhood watch formed to fight al-Qaida in Mesopotamia, they ordered her to stop, according to Lieutenant Kadhim Ahmed al-Tamimi, a detective involved in the case. "When they were in doubt about whether she was a suicide bomber they asked a woman on the street to search her, the woman opened the abaya, and when she saw all the wires, she cried out and ran away," Kadhim said. A few hours later Ranya was in jail along with her mother. Ranya was convicted on 3 August under Iraq's terrorism law and sentenced to seven and a half years in
prison.

One day in March, an interpreter told me that Baida had called several times from the psychiatric hospital and wanted to see us again. We called and told her we would come the next morning. The Rashad psychiatric hospital lies at the very end of the sprawling Shiite slum of Sadr City. Spread over extensive grounds, it had been neglected for years: the grass was shoulder high and the wards almost bare of furnishings (much of it had been looted after the US invasion). Some patients wandered about, talking to themselves. Some looked as if they had not washed in months.

We met Baida in the office of the head nurse for the criminally insane. She looked tired and much less ebullient than when I saw her in jail. I had brought her a bag of fresh oranges. She accepted them with a weak smile and only asked: "When will you come back? Tomorrow?" I worried she needed the company of more normal people. When we returned to the office, one of our other interpreters took me aside.

A military interpreter before he switched to journalism, he was streetwise; a Shiite who lived in a Sunni neighbourhood; a survivor. He told me Baida had called many times in the last three weeks wanting to know when I would visit the hospital - a bad sign, he said. There are no sureties when dealing with insurgents, but one rule is not to tell them exactly when you will be in a particular place. If they know, they can plan an ambush or a kidnapping or detonate an IED under your car. "Don't go to see her again," the interpreter said.

For the next meeting with Baida, our security adviser set a time limit, estimating that as soon as we arrived at the hospital, she might hear we were there and make a phone call to her jihadist friends. Baida called us twice to see "exactly when you are coming". We lied, keeping it vague. When we did finally go, we met with Baida alone. I asked her gently, and as non-judgmentally as I could, whether she wanted to kill me because I was a foreigner. "Frankly, yes." Then she added, to soften it: "Not specifically you, because I know you."

Would she tell her extremist cousins or her friends about me? "I won't sacrifice my friendship," she said. A moment later she reversed herself. "But if they insisted, I would. If they kill Americans they will do a big huge banquet." She smiled beatifically. "Frankly, my cousins called me when they knew I would meet a journalist and translator and they did their best to get your descriptions and the date you would come. They asked me about the date many times. They know the way to the hospital. They would be waiting for you and would kill you. They said to me: 'If you will do that for us, we will help you escape from the hospital, even from prison.' They asked for other details: what were your names; what did you look like?"

She seemed excited now at the thought of our capture. "They do not want to kill you, but to torture you and make lunch of your flesh. I could not do anything to help you." I looked at my watch, worried we had stayed too long. I got up hurriedly, adjusted my veil, and thanked her for her time. Baida was smiling again. "If I had not seen you before and talked to you, I would kill you with my own hands," she said. "Do not be deceived by my peaceful face. I have a heart of stone."

A few days later Baida was transferred back to the jail in Baquba after doctors determined that she had no psychological disorder. "You have a brain like a computer. You shouldn't be here," they told her. At this time of writing she is still in jail. For now, she tells whoever asks that she's prepared to go out and kill the enemy; but if she were to start saying that she no longer would do that, I imagine she would be released quite quickly. And I have no reason to doubt that she would then carry out her dream of blowing herself up.

Alissa J Rubin is the Baghdad bureau chief for the New York Times
guardian.co.uk C Guardian News and Media Limited 2009

The Danger Signs of Terror

Posted: November 24, 2009, 9:00 AM by NP Editor terrorism, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross

In the wake of U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan's shooting rampage at the Fort Hood military base in Texas, experts are debating the process by which people are radicalized into accepting militant Islamic beliefs. Looming large in this debate is the spectre of "profiling," which some commentators reject as Islamophobic. To focus on Muslims, they argue, is to suggest that all Muslims are suspect.

Hasan seems to have been motivated by jihadist ideology. Beyond reports that he shouted " Allahu Akbar!" before opening fire, he reportedly told a colleague at Fort Hood that Muslims should rise up against "aggressors" such as America. Hasan had exchanged numerous e- mails with extremist cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, a known al-Qaeda supporter based in Yemen, and a fellow Muslim officer told Britain's Daily Telegraph that Hasan's eyes "lit up" when discussing his respect for Awlaki.

Information such as this led a Fort Hood officer who had converted to Islam, and who prayed with Hasan the morning of the attack, to conclude "with great sadness" that Hasan "was motivated by religious radicalism."

The Hasan case does not represent the typical situation in which profiling might be used: at an airport security line or a subway bag check, for example. Rather, he came to authorities' attention in December 2008 due to a Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) investigation into another subject with whom he was communicating, possibly Awlaki. A recent FBI press release explained that after Hasan came across the JTTF's radar, they "assessed that the content of those communications was consistent with research being conducted by Major Hasan in his position as a psychiatrist," and thus "concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning."

Did the JTTF reach the right conclusion given the information it had at the time? Or did it miss an opportunity to prevent the massacre? While these questions cannot be answered at this time, they point to the kind of profile that was relevant in this situation: not one that fixates on the fact that Hasan was Muslim, but one that seeks to comprehend what kind of ideas and other manifestations suggest a person represents a terrorist risk.

There have been published attempts at tackling this question. In 2007, the NYPD released Radicalization in the West, a report by Mitchell Silber and Arvin Bhatt, which identifies four phases through which the authors believe homegrown terrorists progress. After the first phase, "pre-radicalization," the study turns to "self-identification," wherein individuals begin exploring fundamentalist Islam "while slowly migrating away from their former identity."

The study's third phase is "indoctrination," where the individuals' newly adopted Salafibeliefs intensify. (The term Salafiis used to describe the fundamentalist religious practices imputed to the first three generations of Muslims who followed the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad.) A person going through this stage "wholly adopts jihadi- Salafiideology and concludes, without question, that the conditions and circumstances exist where action is required to support and further the Salafist cause. That action is militant jihad." The final phase, "jihadization," is when individuals act on that belief, beginning to prepare for a terrorist act. Silber and Bhatt compare this process to a funnel: Though many people begin the radicalization process, few reach the point where they would carry out an attack.

Similarly, this year my associate Laura Grossman and I released a study, titled Homegrown Terrorists in the U.S. and U.K. (FDD Press), that explores external manifestations of radicalization in 117 homegrown jihadi terrorists from the United States and Great Britain.
The manifestations we examined include adopting a legalistic interpretation of Islam, coming to trust only select and ideologically rigid religious authorities, perceiving Islam and the West as irreconcilably opposed, manifesting a low tolerance for perceived theological deviance, and attempting to impose one's religious beliefs on others. We found that these steps occurred frequently enough among the sample to be significant.

The prevalence of these factors suggests the importance of religio- political ideology as individuals radicalize -- an ideology that cannot be described as Islam itself, but rather a rigid and non- mainstream understanding of that faith.

Studying these factors helps make sense of Westerners who have been drawn to Islamist terrorism. One of America's most famous homegrown terrorists is al-Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn, who soon after his conversion to Islam joined a "discussion group" filled with men who possessed a highly legalistic understanding of the faith. Gadahn followed the intricate rules he was taught, and came to see his California mosque's moderate leadership as offering a diluted, inauthentic version of Islam. At one point, he punched the mosque's president in the face during a confrontation.

As he radicalized, Gadahn came to see Islam and the West as irreconcilably opposed. He isolated himself from family members and all things Western, later expressing the idea of a schism between Islam and the West in his first al-Qaeda video.

The behavioural changes highlighted by our study interacted to push Gadahn toward supporting terrorism. They may end up having explanatory value in Nidal Hasan's case as well.

Unfortunately, attempts to engage in serious study of the radicalization process have met with chilly receptions. The NYPD study in particular generated enormous controversy. While that study is by no means above criticism, many critiques suggested that any exploration of this difficult area should be off-limits.

The same kind of arguments have surfaced in the wake of the Fort Hood shootings. If commentators really believe it is inappropriate to explore how terrorists have radicalized, that is their prerogative. But let's be honest about the kind of profiling that is relevant here. From my perch, it seems that understanding how terrorists are made can be used as a tool to protect rights rather than violate them -- to avoid the kind of generalized suspicion that the opponents of profiling rightly fear.

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross is the vice-president of research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and a PhD candidate in world politics at the Catholic University of America. He is the author of My Year Inside Radical Islam (Tarcher/Penguin, 2007). "Constructing a terrorist" is brought to our readers in conjunction with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. For more information, please visit www.defenddemocracy.org.

14th ICID - Abstract Submission Deadline Extended

On behalf of the International Society for Infectious Diseases, I would like to invite you to submit abstracts for presentation at the 14th International Congress on Infectious Diseases.

The Congress will be held in Miami, Florida on March 9-12, 2010. The scientific program for the Congress is nearly complete and we have an outstanding line up of speakers and topics that will be of interest to anyone active in the fields of infectious diseases or travel medicine.

The deadline for abstract submissions to the 14th ICID has been extended to November 30th. I urge you to submit your abstract as soon as possible, and plan on joining your colleagues and peers from around the world in Miami for this educational and enjoyable meeting. Take advantage of reduced registration fees by registering on or before January 15, 2010.

Please visit http://www.isid.org/14th_icid/ for complete information including Congress registration, hotel reservation, and abstract submission instructions.

I look forward to seeing you in Miami.

Raul Isturiz MD

President, ISID

Threat Matrix: Iraqi Troops Kill Chlorine Suicide Bomber

Written by Bill Roggio on November 23, 2009 3:51 PM to Threat Matrix Available online at:
http://www.longwarjournal.org/threat-matrix/archives/2009/11/iraqi_troops_kill_chlorine_sui_1.php


Iraqi soldiers foiled a potentially deadly suicide attack today at the border crossing at Al Qaim in western Anbar province. From Aswat al- Iraq (Voices of Iraq):

"A force from the 28th infantry division managed to defuse a car bomb and to kill its driver in al-Qaim, Anbar province," said the statement received by Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

"The suicide driver carries the Kuwaiti nationality, and had on his possession a fake ID issued from Baiji," the statement added.

"The car was loaded with three tons of Chlorine and C4 as well as other chemical materials," it added.

Having closely followed Iraq over the years, I am immediately reminded of two incidents from the recent past: al Qaeda's attempt to destroy the Awakening in Anbar with a series of potentially deadly chlorine suicide attacks, and a suicide attack in Mosul by a former Guantanamo Bay detainee who had been turned over to Kuwait in late 2005 and released in mid-2006..

From February to May 2007, al Qaeda attempted 10 suicide attacks in Anbar, Baghdad, and Taji where the bombs included chlorine gas containers. US and Iraqi forces also found several chlorine bomb factories in Anbar and Baghdad and intercepted several of the bombs before they were detonated. The attempts to disperse chlorine gas in the explosion were crude; nearly all of the Iraqis were killed in the bomb blasts, but many Iraqis were severely sickened by the strikes. In Anbar, al Qaeda directed many of the chlorine gas attacks at civilian locations; their target was the Awakening, the group of tribes and former insurgents who opposed al Qaeda.

On Easter day in March 2008, Abdullah Salih al Ajmi, the former Guantanamo detainee from Kuwait, rammed a dump truck packed with more than 10,000 pounds of explosives into an Iraqi Army battalion headquarters at Combat Outpost Inman in Mosul. I was embedded with the US Army Military Transition Team responsible for the area, and was on the scene within a half hour. The destruction I saw there was the worst I've encountered while covering the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thirteen Iraqi soldiers were killed, and the outpost was essentially destroyed. Ajmi had been released by the US to the Kuwaiti government despite his promise to carry out attacks. To top it all off, al Qaeda used my photographs taken after the bombing in their martyrdom tape that announced Ajmi's death in the attack.

Jobs

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health & Human Services - New York, NY
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services - Chicago, IL
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services - Dallas, TX
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health & Human Services-Kansas City, MO
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services - Boston, MA
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services - Atlanta, GA
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services - San Francisco, CA
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services - Denver, CO
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health & Human Services - Philadelphia, PA developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Advisor (Regional Emergency Coordinator)
Health & Human Services, Office of the Secretary of Health & Human Services - Seattle, WA
developing public health medical preparedness and health and medical threats and emergencies. Elements within OPEO include the National Disaster Medical
From usajobs.gov - Thursday, November 12

Public Health Training & Outreach Specialist
Del Oro Consulting, Inc. - Springfield, IL
onsite training on EMSystems? specific public health preparedness and response solutions, providing... to enrich public health preparedness and response
From HotJobs - Thursday, November 12

Analyst - Public Health - Medical Reserve Corps - Cybercoders.com - Washington, DC Preparedness Analyst - Analysis - Public Health Health - Emergency - Preparedness - Skills Required - Analyst, Public Health Preparedness, Medical Reserve... $55,000 - $75,000 a year
From Omni-Jobs.com - Tuesday, November 10

Senior Analyst – Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) 43
National Association of County and City Health Officials - Washington, DC
with NACCHO's Public Health Preparedness Programs degree in Public Health or related field and three years of experience in a public health setting, or... $52,369 - $64,938 a year
From Public Health Employment Connection - Tuesday, November 10

Program Manager - CDC DSLR
Lockheed Martin - Atlanta, GA
Office for Terrorism Preparedness and Emergency. The system is used to manage public health preparedness grants to State and Local Health Departments by
From Intelligencecareers.com - Tuesday, November 10

EPIDEMIOLOGY INVESTIGATION PROJECT MANAGER
Franklin County, OH
State Epidemiology Office, the Office of Public Health Preparedness, public health officials, healthcare... Team, or similar public health response team which
From GovernmentJobs.com - Wednesday, November 11

DIR EOC/EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS
SAINT MARYS REGIONAL MED CTR - Reno, NV
Medical Center in Reno, NV, is a 380-bed hospital and standards. Certifications in Safety, Emergency Preparedness fields preferred. Minimum of five years
From Catholic Healthcare West - Tuesday, November 10

Emergency Preparedness Coordinator
St. Joseph's Medical Center - Brainerd, MN
Day Hours An Emergency Preparedness Coordinator integration of the Medical Center's plans withregional emergency preparedness plans with the overall
From St. Joseph's Medical Center - Thursday, November 12

Third Annual Homeland Security Essay Contest

The Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS) has announced this year’s essay question: "How can, or should, the United States make homeland security a more layered, networked, and resilient endeavor involving all citizens?" Have some thoughts on this topic? You could win the $1500 cash award and an invitation to Monterey, California where the winner will be recognized at the CHDS Forum. The winning and four top finalist essays will be considered for publication in Homeland Security Affairs, the online journal published by CHDS. Deadline for submission is January 31, 2010. Visit the essay information page for more details, and read last year’s winning essay by Valerie Yeager for inspiration.

Mass Shooting Materials

After the multiple recent active shooter/mass shooting incidents.

NO COST Training Materials:

Active Shooter and 4th/5th Generation Warfare PPT, video materials and references: http://www.officer.com/posa/index.jsp?siteSection=30

AND

Preparation for and Response to Mass Shooting Events http://www.ffsupport.org/training.html

Mass shooting events are becoming more common, and the response to them involves every public safety agency for miles around. This program details the actions that fire and EMS agencies can take to prepare themselves for this all-too-likely event, and the actions they can take when the event occurs.

It covers: Multi-agency planning and preparation, creating a prevention environment command, command post and crowd control issues for this kind of event, an overview of the tactics that agencies should be familiar with this program is available in two formats. The 40+ PowerPoint slide presentation covers the material thoroughly, while the 45-minute video program is a verbal presentation of the PowerPoint material. http://www.ffsupport.org/training.html

FYI - Thursday, November 12th at 10:00 p.m.

“Dirty Bomb Attack”

Thursday November 12 / 10PM
National Geographic Channel

In Dirty Bomb Attack, a one-hour docudrama for the National Geographic Channel, a US city is the target of a hypothetical radiological attack. The episode begins with a dramatization of a car bomb detonating in a busy street and sets up the question, what happens next?" The answer is given through the lens of representative characters: a victim near the blast site whose radiation symptoms develop over time; first responders who go into the hot zone to save lives and help with the clean up; a pregnant mother and her child living in a contaminated area who must be evacuated and forensic scientists who comb through evidence to determine how lethal the attack was and who is responsible. By concentrating on these key story lines and weaving back and forth between them Dirty Bomb Attack paints an accurate and often gripping picture of the aftermath of a radiological attack and gives viewers useful information in the event that we ever find ourselves faced with this kind of disaster in the future.

OSHA releases Best Practices for Protecting EMS Responders during Treatment andTransport of Victims of Hazardous Substance Releases

OSHA releases Best Practices for Protecting EMS Responders during
Treatment andTransport of Victims of Hazardous Substance Releases

From the Executive Summary:

In 2005, OSHA published the Best Practices for Hospital-Based First
Receivers guide that provided guidance for those healthcare facilities
that receive and treat victims of hazardous substance releases. At the
request of stakeholders that participated in the development of that
guide,OSHA has developed a similar guide for emergency medical service
(EMS)responders who provide medical assistance during an incident
involving a hazardous substance release. This guide is intended for
employers of EMS responders and discusses the measures these employers
need to take to protect their EMS responders from becoming additional
victims while on the front lineof medical response.

Scope

EMS responders are broadly defined here as the individuals who provide
pre-hospital emergency medical care and patient transportation. Some EMS
responders are also assigned duties that support patient care, including
patient decontamination. For the purpose of this guide, the term EMS
responder refers to all levels of emergency medical personnel involved
in incident response (e.g., emergency medical technicians [EMTs],
paramedics, and others who perform similar duties). While many EMS
responders are cross-trained(e.g., EMT and firefighter), this guide
applies to these workers only when they are functioning as EMS
responders.

The document can be downloaded at:

http://osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3370-protecting-EMS-respondersSM.pdf
<http://osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3370-protecting-EMS-respondersSM.pdf>

Hospital Management of Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and Explosive Incidents Course

Click on photo to enlarge

The US Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense is offering the state-of-the-art "Hospital Management of Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear & Explosive Incidents Course", 1-5 Feb 2010 (attached flyer). To begin the process click on the link "I Am Interested", fill out the form on the Chemical Casualty Care Division web site and a registration packet will be returned to you to complete/return:

https://ccc.apgea.army.mil/courses/in_house/cbrne.htm

Or, you can send a request directly to: usamricdcccmail@amedd.army.mil

PhilaU Connect - November 23rd

PhilaU Connect: Professional International Presentations

Will be presenting

“Emergency Management and Continuity of
Operations in the Federal Government"

November 23, 2009 at 2:00 p.m. (Eastern Time)

The PhilaU Connect Professional International Presentations is proud to present Mike Riley who is the Chief of the Office of Emergency Management and Safety and the Designated Safety and Health Official for the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, a component of the Department of Homeland Security. Mr. Riley’s background includes more than 25 years as an emergency manager, paramedic, disaster responder, and police officer. He has worked for a number of years with the National Disaster Medical System and has worked and volunteered both nationally and internationally in EMS systems. Mr. Riley has combined this experience to create a safe and healthy work environment at USCIS and ensure a Continuity of Operations and Emergency Response capability across the agency.

Instructions outlining how to join the PhilaU Connect will be sent via email prior to the event. Each PhilaU Connect presentation will include a certificate of attendance emailed to the attendee. Questions or to register, please contact Annette Solarski at solarskia@philau.edu.

The Ryan White Treatment Extension Act

The Ryan White Treatment Extension Act

The Ryan White Treatment Extension Act (PDF, 39.6 Kb) includes a provision requiring hospitals to alert EMS workers within 48 hours of exposure to infectious diseases. Considering there are several new additions to this Act that affect emergency responders, the Emergency Management and Response—Information Sharing and Analysis Center (EMR-ISAC) examined the document.

The National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians (NAEMT) news brief states members of Advocates for EMS, including NAEMT, the National Volunteer Fire Council, the International Association of Fire Fighters, the International Association of Fire Chiefs, and the National Association of Government Employees, successfully advocated to have the notification provision again included into the Act.

The bill adds a new section to the Ryan White Act—Part G “Notification of Possible Exposure to Infectious Diseases.” According to the National Association of State EMS Officials Summary (PDF, 39.6 Kb), a list will be established to determine what infectious diseases should be considered “potentially life-threatening” and whether or not a first responder must be notified of an exposure. The EMR-ISAC noted that the Secretary of Health and Human Service has up to 180 days after enactment to complete the development of the following:

· A list of potential life-threatening diseases that emergency responders may be exposed to when responding to emergencies. This list will be distributed to the public and the states.

· Guidelines describing the circumstances in which such employees may be exposed to listed diseases.

· Guidelines describing the manner in which medical facilities should make requested determinations as to whether or not a patient had an infectious disease.

2010 Harvard Fire Executive Fellowship

2010 Harvard Fire Executive Fellowship

The U.S. Fire Administration’s October 23, 2009 memo announced the opening of the application period for the 2010 Harvard Fire Executive Fellowship Program (PDF, 770 Kb). The Emergency Management and Response—Information Sharing and Analysis Center (EMR-ISAC) learned that the program is once again sponsored through a partnership between the International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC), Fire Protection Publication/International Fire Service Training Association (FPP/IFSTA), the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), and the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA).

Senior fire executives who are selected will be awarded fellowships to attend Harvard’s annual “Program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government” as a 3-week program conducted on-campus. According to U.S. Fire Administrator Kelvin Cochran, “the program can provide tools and experiences in confronting the collective challenges which fire executives face.”

http://www.usfa.dhs.gov/downloads/pdf/publications/harvard.pdf

[EM] Epic Flooding

Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

The epic flooding that hit the Atlanta area in September was so extremely rare that, six weeks later this event has defied attempts to describe it. Scientists have reviewed the numbers and they are stunning.

"At some sites, the annual chance of a flood of this magnitude was so significantly less than 1 in 500 that, given the relatively short length of streamgaging records (well less than 100 years), the U.S. Geological Survey cannot accurately characterize the probability due to its extreme rarity," said Robert Holmes, USGS National Flood Program Coordinator. "Nationwide, given that our oldest streamgaging records span about 100 years, the USGS does not cite probabilities for floods that are beyond a 0.2 percent (500-year) flood."

"If a 0.2 percent (500-year) flood was a cup of coffee, this one brewed a full pot," said Brian McCallum, Assistant Director for the USGS Georgia Water Science Center in Atlanta. "This flood overtopped 20 USGS streamgages - one by 12 feet. The closest numbers we have seen like these in Georgia were from Tropical Storm Alberto in 1994. This flood was off the charts."

The rains returned water levels in the region's two largest reservoirs, Lake Lanier and Allatoona Lake, to pre-drought levels. Lake Lanier rose by more than three feet to 1068 feet by Sept. 25 and returned to full pool in October. Allatoona Lake rose to 853.25 feet on Sept 23, more than 13 feet over full pool of 840 feet.

"The flooding in Atlanta is certainly near the top of the list of the worst floods in the United States during the past 100 years," said Holmes. "For comparable drainage areas, the magnitude of this flood was worse than the 1977 Kansas City flood, which caused tremendous destruction and loss of life. It is a testament to the diligence of county officials and emergency management teams that more lives were not lost in Georgia."

Significant property losses, however, were a near certainty from this event. According to the National Weather Service, some locations recorded up to 20 inches of rain from 8:00 pm on Sept. 20 to 8:00 pm the following day. Culverts and sewers are not usually designed for events of this magnitude because they are so rare and it is cost prohibitive.

"Applying rainfall frequency calculations, we have determined that the chance of 10 inches or more occurring at any given point are less than one hundredth of one percent", said Kent Frantz, Senior Service Hydrologist for the National Weather Service at Peachtree City. "This means that the chance of an event like this occurring is 1 in 10,000."

For this analysis, USGS reviewed high-water-mark surveys and indirect peak discharge computations throughout the flood-affected region. Scientists gather these data from the field during floods and in their immediate aftermath to supplement or in this case, to provide data after a gage is destroyed. Some notable results:

* In Cobb County, Sweetwater, Noonday, Butler, and Powder Springs creeks flooded so severely that the annual chance of a worse event is far smaller than 0.2 percent (500-year) flood. On Sweetwater Creek near Austell, Ga., high-water marks showed a peak stage of 30.8 feet. The peak flow (31,500 cubic feet per second) was more than double the previous peak flow recorded at this site during the last 73 years. The previous peak, caused by the remnants of Hurricane Dennis in July 2005, was almost 10 feet lower at 21.87 feet.

* In Douglas County, the Dog River near Fairplay overtopped the USGS stream gage by 12 feet. The peak stage was 33.8 feet, with a peak discharge of 59,900 cubic feet per second. This is well beyond the 0.2 percent annual exceedence probability (500-year) flood.

* Gwinnett, DeKalb and Rockdale counties also had record flooding. Suwanee Creek floods were beyond the 0.2 percent annual exceedence probability (500-year) flood.

* On the Chattahoochee, the USGS gage at Vinings reached a peak stage of 28.12 feet with 40,900 cubic feet per second, which represents between a between a 1.0 to 0.5 percent annual exceedence probability (100- to 200-year) flood.

In Georgia the USGS maintains a network of nearly 300 streamgages that provide data in real time. Data from these streamgages are used by local, state and federal officials for numerous purposes, including public safety and flood forecasting by the National Weather Service. A map of these gages and graphs of discharge for the last seven days is available online http://ga.water.usgs.gov/flooding-sept09.html.

The USGS works in cooperation with other Federal, state, and local agencies, throughout Georgia that measure water level (stage), streamflow (discharge), lake levels and rainfall.

Users can access current flood and high flow conditions across the country at the USGS WaterWatch Web site http://water.usgs.gov/waterwatch/flood.

Research Opportunity

ITRR is looking for researchers for an online project. Researchers should be willing to work under pressure and deal with domestic terror issues. Interested candidates please send your resume to arichman@itrrintel.org.

H1N1 - iPod App

Harvard Medical Center has jumped on the swine flu-info bandwagon with the release of an iPhone app to educate individuals and businesses about the ongoing H1N1 pandemic.

This App is available at the iTunes store and can be downloaded and used on the iPhone and the iPod Touch.

Follow this link for more apps about the H1N1 flu.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/10/27/h1n1_iphone_apps/

Thanks....Buzz

Robert Buzzerd RN,MS,NREMT-Paramedic
MICN
AtlantiCare EMS
Atlantic City, NJ