By Julie BUTCHER

“You know how we typically talk about surviving for 72 hours after a disaster? Three days?” local emergency preparedness trainer and advocate Paul Dutton asked without waiting for an answer. “Add a zero to that. Can you survive 30 days without clean water, food, gas or power? It’ll take So Cal Edison 18 months to restore power. Can you evacuate your house in 30 minutes?” he asks as another question. “Can you evacuate your house in two hours?”

Dutton – and his wife and preparedness partner Lisa – know what they are talking about. The upcoming Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training set for this October will be their 35th class; they have trained almost 700 community members to be the first responders to disasters since they started CERT training in the area in 2005.

In a disaster, help will come first from family, friends and neighbors. According to Dutton, calling 9-1-1 will be useless in an emergency.

“Love the FD (fire department). Love the PD (police department), but there aren’t enough of them to respond,” he said.

Recently, the City of Los Angeles’ emergency preparedness staff said the same thing: “We don’t have enough police officers and firemen” to help everyone affected by a huge quake, said Crisanta Gonzalez of the city’s Emergency Management Department. “We’re not coming.”

“Take this training,” Dutton urged. “These 24 hours of preparedness training will keep you from thinking like a victim and have you thinking like a rescuer.”

The CERT training is scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 28 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.; on Oct. 1, 2, and 3 (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday) from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.; then wrapping up on Saturday, Oct. 5 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

The training is free. Participants must complete all of the hours to qualify for a certificate and may be asked to spend $58 for an emergency backpack and CERT gear.

Spots fill up quickly, so community members are urged to call Paul or Lisa Dutton at (818) 249-8378 or reach them by email at midnightscout@sbcglobal.net to sign up.

The CERT training course is designed to teach community members to “help you protect yourself, your family, your neighbors and your neighborhood in an emergency situation.” The training includes learning to treat medical killers by opening airways, controlling bleeding and treating for shock; teaching basic medical aid and search and rescue skills; collecting disaster intelligence to best assist first responders; teaching basic fire safety; and organizing volunteers for the best response in an emergency.

“People learn more about putting on their seat belts on a plane than about how to keep their home and families safe,” Dutton said, detailing a few of the topics covered. “We’ll put together a family disaster plan and a family reunification plan.”

  Julie BUTCHER