patrick halloran: All right, so different country, different system, same mission. Today we're sitting down with an Australian USAR specialist to break down how they operate, what they do differently, and what we can learn from it. From local deployments to international responses, this is a look at rescue from a global perspective. So welcome back to the Rescue Lab Podcast. We break down tech rescue, USAR, and real lessons that come from the job. I'm your host, PJ Halloran, and today we have a great conversation lined up. We're joined by Australian USAR specialist Matt Herbert. To talk about how their system works, how they train, and what happens when the team deploys internationally into large scale disasters. This is one of those episodes where you'll learn how the job gets done outside the US and where the similarities and differences really matter. So, Matt, just gonna go ahead and let you introduce yourself. Thank you for being with us. Tell us about yourself. No worries, mate. You got me. You got me on. ⁓ I got you. Yeah, you did. Yeah, so Matt Herbert, as you said, so I'm currently a station officer with Queensland Fire Department, which I think is a equivalent to a captain for you guys over there. You and me, buddy captains. All right, there we go. Yeah. So background I joined the Air Force in two thousand and two, the Australian Air Force. I did aircraft refueling for a couple of years and then remastered, like changed jobs in the Air Force to firefighter in the Air Force in 2004. And then ⁓ did a few years of that in the Air Force and then got into Queensland Fire Department, or which back then was called Queensland Fire and Rescue Service. in two thousand seven and has since I've since stayed on the Air Force as a reservist to today, still current serving Air Force. ⁓ so two thousand seven got in the fire department and tech rescue so both my brothers are in the fire department and my uncle was and my cousin is. Like it's a bit of a typical family, fire family. And so my oldest brother, he was already, I think, a swift water instructor by then. So our we have the five disciplines of tech rescue. So I sort of had an interest from early on. And obviously having him pretty heavily involved in it made me want to look down that path. I was I wanna do a few years on the trucks first, like three years I think I did, and then put in to do level two technician. So twenty ten I did vert rescue, confined space and trench rescue. And then twenty eleven. So that takes about a year to do all of our courses. So twenty eleven I did urban search and rescue course and ⁓ swift water rescue course. So that was ⁓ yeah, twenty eleven and still Currently a technician with our fire department as well. Do you guys have I know y you're a state based fire department. Do you have a certain tech rescue team on the fire department side or how is that broken up? So we have what you probably would call squad trucks. We call them lemurs, tech rescue truck. Each region generally so yeah, like you said, we're a state fire department. So it's quite big, the area, as in Queensland's a big state, but we're broken down into regions. We've just recently had a big reform, sort of change of government, change of How the fire department looks about two years ago. So now we're down to four regions. We were seven, I think. So they're a bit smaller, but now they're sort of bigger. But either way, we're sort of very heavy in the southeast corner, like where the capital of Brisbane is, the Gold Coast, which we've heard of, Sunshine Coast. That's obviously more popular, so there's more people in those departments. And then the further up the state you go, it's a bit more spread out. Like the stations are a bit more spread out. And there's also more ⁓ part timers, so volunteers, you might think you call ⁓ Exactly. Yep. in those areas. ⁓ so each region generally has a at least one lima, a tech rescue truck. And so they're firefighters, station officers, but who are also done the courses and are qualified. So they'll ride the So you cross train in the tech rescue. Yeah. And generally like so one of the the hub stations is Roma Street in the city where I spent about ten years in there. And that's the where the Brisbane region where I work, that's where the tech rescue truck has always been. So that's like de definitely a hub. Generally if you end up working there sort of permanently you'll Whether you were going to or not, you'd probably fall into tech rescue almost by you're there, they're always training, you know. So you sort of Yeah. And what does that what does that training look like? ⁓ if you're cross training, you obviously are doing your fire stuff. How often are you training tech rescue ⁓ to stay current? Like on shift? Yeah. Well, probably every two, you're generally doing something, especially at the hub stations. Like if you're in working with a few guys who are qualified or girls as well. Yeah. There's generally always someone keen to ⁓ let's work on rope rigging or let's go off the tower 'cause we've got the well not the tower, the roof of the r the fire stations, I don't know, nineteen, twenty meters maybe. So doing some vert stuff off that. Sorry, for for the American audience, twenty meters. You gotta you gotta you gotta help me out. Sixty feet? Perfect, yeah, that's great. Three feet to a to a button. I'll take it. Yep. So big enough that you can do scenarios and that sort of thing. Exactly. It's obviously all being a s in in the city, this station, it's very busy with you know alarms and all sorts of stuff. But it's generally always ongoing or there's always some juniors or some other firefighters who are going in to their tech rescue courses in the lead up in the next six months. Exactly. You're sort of constantly going over not just the technical stuff but the basics really. So in in the city Or in your region, do you get a lot of tech rescue call outs? For that that station, well obviously that's where the the truck is, so and that will go the whole region. Like that's not just confined to the city area. It varies like to be honest, the last probably five, six years, the most amount of jobs I reckon the Lemas go to are mountain rescue now. About half an hour north of here between sort of Brisbane, the Metro and Sunshine Coast, which is another big populous area. There's what they call the glasshouse mountains. It's super popular. People do proper climb, like rock climbing, then that but there's also tourist tracks, but some pretty challenging ones as well. And you know, what happens obviously with a lot of public, they sort of overestimate their skill set. And there is literally mountain rescue jobs every weekend, I reckon. Really? All the time. So that ended up forming another technical rescue stream, almost which is called Mountain Rescue. 'Cause initially it just ⁓ like level twos, vertical rescue technicians going up to respond, and then the sort of over time they realize we need to actually develop a mountain rescue course. So like you know, lead climbing and that sort of thing. So it's sort of this really specialized skill set. I haven't done it. I'm sort of not really much of a climber, definitely not a lead climber, so I'm like, nah, I'll be right. Yeah. It can be terrifying. Yeah. So that's probably the most, I reckon, lately. In in the city Do you guys do a lot of elevator rescues? I mean, here we do. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, plenty of that. And how do you a lot of like blind shaft rescues? Not top hatch rescues. Not too many like proper legit sort of technical rescues, I guess. It's just the the elevat rescues are a they send the lemur tour anyway. ⁓ but occasionally there would be some, but not that common to be honest. Gotcha. A couple of years ago, I don't know, three or four years ago, I'm sure you Might have had it over there, I'm not sure, like the Extinction Rebellion protesters. Did you have that over there? Yeah, it sounds familiar. It like the oil Yeah, everything and they hate everyone and everything. So they were doing heaps of like they'll set up their bamboo and sit on a h like they're actually pretty good at their rigging. Like they'll set up and they're not right. They're taking the same courses. Yeah. Yeah. And so they'll set that up in the middle of the main street in the city and just create chaos. And the the police can't really just go down and lop ⁓ down. So that's like Protracted instruments like that, gluing themselves in four to four gallon drums, like they'll Yes or the sod and then they'll glue themselves in or con whatever, all sort glue themselves to the road, all this Yeah, so like the protester extrication. Yeah, so there was for a while, there was like every few weeks there was a new job to do with that. It was That's interesting. Yeah, we definitely have that over here as well. So we're on the we're on the same page. I figured sort of how did you how did you get onto the USAR, the Australian USAR team, or how does that pipeline work to join that? Yep. So when you apply to do Tet Rescue with our department, you sign up to do all five disciplines. So Vert rescue, Trench Rescue, Confined Space, USA Swift Water. However, like if you're up in the regions, like so up Cairns, I don't know if you've heard of I's sorry, Cairns. I've been to Cairns. There you I've been diving up there. Right. So yeah, like up there, Towns all, they'll get on it. But they might they might take a couple of years to get on a course because more of the slots in the course are for the southeast corner because that's where we're gonna deploy from. So you need to be, you know, within a two or three hour drive of the deployment center. But anyway, you you sign up basically to do it. So you naturally will get on that course within a year or two. ⁓ and as long as you pass it, then you're a qualified level two USAR technician and you're then part of the ⁓ Oz One USAR team. Gotta get, you know, all the vaccinations and all that sort of stuff. There's Because our team is funded by D Fat, which is like the DeFa ⁓ Australian Defence Force or No, it's a federal government, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. So I'm just trying to think of who that be like not FEMA. Like the National Fire Service or FEMA, exactly. Or home affairs, mate. I don't know. Whoever sort of Yeah, Homeland Security, something like that. Yeah, I can't think So ours ours is ours falls under FEMA, so it must be an equivalent. Yeah, well she probably is 'cause they well, are they FEMA's more just a fire entity though, isn't it? And and it's it's a federal government, it's a sector of the federal government that responds to disasters. Okay. So DFAT isn't just to do with disasters. It's like It's like an umbrella. Yeah. But under that is obviously there's different components. And so as part of some funding that Queensland Fire Department or OS One get, you obviously have to be obviously deployable. You you've got so many or this is more of an INSIRAG, sorry, I'm getting to INSIRAG already. ⁓ Yeah, it's we'll talk about that for sure. Yeah. ⁓ but you know, they pay for to all your vaccinations so you can deploy anywhere in the world and you don't you know, obviously you need to be vaccinated in some areas. ⁓ that's just one one thing. But that's basically So you have to stay you have to stay green as we call it. Yeah. You have to be ready to deploy. Yeah. Yeah. And with that you do every two years you gotta do a a workshop, like a three day so like a use art hands on workshop or it varies. Every couple of years they change the what they're concentrating on, but ⁓ then also during the year we've got we call a logbook and there's certain codes you've got to tick off you don't train or go over so you're remaining sort of on top of your currencies and your maintenance you know your skills maintenance. Yeah. So we have it'd probably be the equivalent of like a task book. Yeah. Yeah. It'd be the same. Yeah. Now do you have I mean we have we have twenty eight FEMA USAR teams in the States. You just have Ozzy one, right? In Queensland, Oz one, yep. In New South Wales, Sydney, there's Oz two. So they're only two Insirag teams and that's all that D FAT will provide funding for. They don't need more than two international teams because it's you just don't deploy enough. Right. So other states like Victoria or Five Rescue Victoria, whatever they're called now, Tasmania, Western Australia, they might have they have little shouldn't say little. They're used are sort of like regional teams capabilities, but it's not like the depth that you have with your FEMA in state teams. They're not as that established as task force task forces. There are more just sort of local response and that sort of thing. It's pretty rare for them to be a a full task force that don't have sort of what you guys have in all yours. No, I think that so we have our FEMA teams, but there's been a big proliferation in state teams or like state task forces that have have jumped up and there's and I I don't know how it works in Australia, but for a FEMA team to get spun up, it is there's a lot of hoops to jump through to go anywhere in the States. But these state teams can move very quickly and respond to other states at a request. Yeah. So does O can Os one go to like the West Coast to help out with a disaster? Or like is that is that something that you're just called for and you can go, or is that something that has to be decided between the states? It's like any disaster. They've they've got a call for it, as in like the same with international. ⁓ but we I don't think we've ever actually deployed interstate as Os one sort of thing. Like we're always doing deployments interstate for Swift Water or fire various things, but more so they request for a certain capability or a certain amount of people and trucks or whatever, depending on the scenario. We very rarely yeah, and I don't know if we've I don't think we ever have deployed as OS one, say interstate. We've done it in our state, like up to Cairns for cyclones, like if with like all the time. 'Cause we obviously there's there's cyclones every year up. We're like the Florida of of Australia. We get cyclones and or pain. So disaster prone. So we've deployed like full use our teams up north several times. Yeah. And so you talked about the task book training. So like we have inside our task force, we have like a monthly drill. Do you guys have that month like that where the team gets together, but I guess not because your region's so big, or you just have to work that task book on your own? Pretty much it's at your ⁓ on your on at station level or region level. So the regions will the training officers will try and organize some training days here and there, but the only time we'll get together as a whole is once a year we'll ⁓ organise a major exercise. So prior to my current drones job I'm doing at the moment, I was in our state technical rescue unit for a couple of years who sort of organi and the USA was my portfolio and you organize courses and workshops and all that. And one of the things you also organize a yearly exercise. It's like a forty eight hour exercise. ⁓ we deploy the whole heavy cache to a predetermined site. Like we know we've got our rubble pile at the school, but we're We've got an area where we'll set up our base of operations and that sort of stuff. We'll go through the whole setup and everything exactly. Russian packs and sort of have it's led by the instructors. So we call that we call that our Mobex. Yeah, yeah, okay. So that yeah. We call it DartX lock because our our team is disaster assistance response team. So data. Do you find that Do you find that it's hard for the team to maintain readiness between deployments given that it's kind of station based? Not really, 'cause everyone gets trained to the same level and we still always come back to Brisbane, like the Academy, for our ongoing workshops, or the three day workshop we've got to do every couple of years. You can try and do them every year if there's spare spots you can put in to go and do it. And with the DartX and nearly every region has a senior instructor in their region who can sort of push that. training capability, keeping it going. Particularly like South East Corner, like Brisbane and Sunshine Coast, Gold Coast. We've got lots of instructors and, you know, guys who have been in USA for twenty years, thirty years, or maybe not thirty, but close, you know. So it's but it's also up to the regions themselves to make sure their people are deployable. So but that's also on the individual. Each person's gotta know they've got all their kit all their kit ready, it's all good to go. Nothing's worn out, out of date, whatever. That's just, you know, individual, making sure they're Good to go. And so you you mentioned some of the deployments up north. Walk us through one of those deployments and like what's the biggest challenges on those incidents? So you you said a lot of like cyclones up there. Yeah. So you respond to one of those. What does that look like on the ⁓ the task force side? So as soon as it looks like there's something coming, where I was working at technical rescue unit at a deployment center, you just get so busy. For days leading up, you're just flat out 'cause you're getting the case ready, like on a truck. We've very rarely fly the cache if it's interstate, we'll only fly the cache international with the Air Force. But you're sort of loading it if it's not already on the truck, it's on the wall, so you're getting all that going, you're getting all the various equipment, working with the state fire control centre to get the people, like organizing the whole team. But generally most of the team will fly and a few will drive the trucks, like two or three trucks, semi trailers. ⁓ so I'm just thinking of one Cyclone Debbie in twenty seventeen. was gonna be a big one. It was a big one. ⁓ so that was first forecast to come over towards Cairns. So they forward deployed us up there a couple of days before and then it kept sort of tracking s more south and more south. So they just sort of moved us down and eventually sort of figured out okay, it's roughly gonna be here and then spread us all out in smaller groups, smaller teams, more so initially as like Swift Water Rescue, 'cause obviously pretty much everyone on that team is a level two Swift Water technician. So you take your swift water kit as well, not just your you saw. And that was sort of they just you know, the incident management teams are figuring out where to place all the teams and you know, where's likely to get hit, where's most prone to flooding because your cyclone brings a heap of rain. So I ended up in a town called Bowen, ⁓ which is a couple of hours south of Townsville, which pretty much got the eye of the cyclone or just above it. And well, incredible the the power of a cat five cyclone was insane. Yeah yeah. For a little bit and then quickly dropped back da back to cat four, I think. ⁓ but during the daytime too, that was the first one I had in during the day where, you know, a lot of time they hit overnight. But ⁓ came through on a Tuesday, sort of ripped everything to shreds as it does, a a big area. And once it's sort of once the winds are up over a hundred K an hour, we're d we bunker down, we don't we don't go out. I think that's pretty standard why. So we just sort of hung around we're actually I was actually staying in a castle. It's a castle hotel. Yeah. Sort of like Castle, not really castle, but it was a pretty good place to be. And so came through on a Tuesday and into night. I think that night we might have started to go out to some jobs from memory I can't remember. The next day, sort of once it'd gone, obviously a lot of flooding, a lot of damage. We go out and see anyone, people were stranded, that sort of thing, check damage, start the USA sort of, I guess. And then that night, ⁓ a like a rain event was coming behind it. So it it stopped. It was like fine and sunny, like the cyclone was gone. And then that night, this dump of rain was just ridiculous and caused more flooding than the cyclone didn't. It was insane. So that was like jobs sort of yeah, going out to you know, get people to houses and this sort of thing and at night in North Queensland and you know what goes through your mind when you're in the water in North Queensland. Yeah, what else is in the what else is in the water with you? So that was a big night. It's sort of like Then we started the whole thing again the next morning, essentially, 'cause this rain event just ripped through and dumped I can't remember how much, but it was crazy. Yeah. And how how big is how big is that team that's operating that area? I know you you break down into swipwater stuff, but how big of a team or a force are you sending to that event? So that one, 'cause they knew it was gonna be pretty big cyclone, they sent I think like full task for I I wouldn't say it's seventy five. Like our full task force is obviously seventy five, but that includes like engineers and doctors examine, yeah. Mechanic yeah, all that. But it w would have been, I'm guessing I don't know, fifty odd, I think but guessing, but it was a pretty decent sized team for an in intra state deployment. But then there was obviously all the local firefighters who were, you know, situated around the various areas it was going to hit. Their extra level two swift water crews were stood up and that sort of thing. There was people ever there was firefighters everywhere. What do you guys what do you use for boats on the Swiftwater side? I would get Otto or I WP in A raft. They call it raft. ⁓ just a standard raft, ⁓ was it top top one raft. Yeah, typical what you see going down the rapids. I can't think of it called now. And we've also got ⁓ Zodiac motorized Suffoto Rescue Craft. So that the motorized capability only came in I did the first course and that was twenty seventeen. We had sh Wow, okay. We had big flooding in Brisbane in twenty eleven. It was all over the news, it was massive, like 'cause it's we've since then had a couple more. But Yeah. quite a few people died in that and the com commission of inquiry was held a couple of years after and one of the findings was was that the fire department swift water response needs a motorised capability 'cause we're just paddling. Yeah. You know, we've got paddles and some as you know, the situations you can get in, you're not getting far with paddles. So that walked out this new capability of motorised swift water rescue. So we obviously have those and depending on the environment where you can use that, you can't use that any everywhere. ⁓ like in Bowen during that cyclone I didn't I didn't get in a motorised boat. Well actually no, I wouldn't have done it then. The the capability wasn't in. It was later that year, actually it started. Yeah. And how how was that to integrate onto the task force? Because you have to retrain everybody almost to that same level of a boat up. They sort of gradually started to build the numbers. Like I think now around the state, I reckon we've got about three hundred and fifty level two swift water technicians. Maybe four hundred, I don't know. Say let's say three fifty. Out of those, I reckon there'll be Hundred and fifty maybe who are motorised qualified. So you got about halfway. Yeah. But they I don't think their plan is to get everyone up. ⁓ because some areas don't have the capability anyway. I'm not sure how it all works. It's sort of well above my pay grade, but I understand that totally. ⁓ but it is growing. When you're out on sorry. It is growing and we just use it so much now. Like one events and all that. It's like it's changed the game for us. It's so much better. Yeah, no, and that's that's a good thing. And he wants to paddle one, you can just go Well, absolutely. It's way it looks way cooler too. When you're out and you're you're working on the USAR side, so on our side we use something called SARCOP. And I don't know if that's something you guys integrate. It's like a mobile based thing where you can actually ⁓ track where you've searched, you can put search markers. How do you get like a wide area search? How are you plotting and planning where teams are working at or where you have tracked? Just GPS or yeah, and we have a couple of apps, Survey1, 2, 3, where you're doing damage assessments as you go on or survey one, two, three, yep. Yeah, so you know that, yeah. So that's the main one we use and the various functions that can do for searches and damage assessments and where or i there's also impact note, which is similar. It's like a damage assessment, but it's more just before the event is while the event is going, impact notes just get Quick info back to the incident command centers to enable do we need more ⁓ resources in that area or that sort of thing. But then, you know, searching and ⁓ damage assessments is yeah, generally done on the survey one, two, three. Except for in how long? Right in the in the moment. Like if it's all gone, you you might just put a bit of tape on a car. You've searched the car, you've put some tape or a and h how long have you guys been using the survey one, two, three? Probably close to ten years or ⁓ okay. What was what was the the norm before that? Trimble? Have you heard of the Trim well this is USA space, the Trimble? Did you s did you say Bumble, the dating app? You said you're on Grinder and I'll ⁓ Trimble. No, that's where we met. Yeah. This is the weirdest grinder date I've ever been on, but Yeah, this is strange, but you know what? I think it's working out. It'll be fine. So Trimb Trimble was a Trimble was this like it it looked like a game boy almost. It was this big chunk of a thing and you had like an old school screen and you sort of tap take a photo, but it's like the most pixelated thing ever. And then you click okay, how severely damaged, ⁓ how high was the water, slow, so slow. Yeah. And this is like, yeah, damage assessment posts. This isn't during when shit's going on. Sorry, mate. I swear on this? Yeah, absolutely. ⁓ this is America. You can do anything you want. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that was just This big old clunky thing, but once we sort of got to the apps, it was yeah, a lot quicker and and better. And it can then obviously people can monitor that remotely and see live updates. Yeah. I think that's probably been one of the biggest things that's come on the USR side from like survey one, two, three is now like the leadership IST stakeholder side has that almost immediate picture of what's happening ⁓ in that area and where they need to send support or capabilities. On the operational side, do you think that there's anything you guys do specifically different from the US use R wise or or anything? But we don't. I mean, I I on from my brain, I see like you guys get back from a day of rescuing people and you're all cracking fosters. Is that just a a stereotype that I'm thinking about? No, we're doing that while we're doing the job. Okay. That's perfect. Yeah. I mean it come on, Foster's is water. It's essentially water. True. Yeah. No one flavored water. No one in Australia drinks Fosses, let me tell you that. I know. The only time I've drank Fosses is when I lived in London about twenty something years ago. Everyone you were just homesick? Yeah. Well just people drinking over there, so Yeah, it's a great culture. Yeah. But is there anything that you think that from I obviously I mean, backstory for people that are listening, me and you met at the USAR conference in Orlando and so and I you you obviously been to this area. You've you worked that's another story. You worked up in Toronto for a bit. Yeah. As a firefighter. And ex in an exchange program. That's a whole other ⁓ podcast because that's a really cool program. But you've I think you've you know you've mingled with the American USAR teams. Is there something that you kind of took away that you're like, ⁓ wow, we don't do that back home. Guess definitely from the fame attains, because obviously I did that USAR logistics course before the conference. Yes. The FEMA teams and your state teams, like you have these big convoys of your cache team. We're sort of not I did mention before, yeah, we send the ⁓ the semi trailers with all the cache, but it's like two, maybe three trucks and everyone else just flies because our state is so big and we just don't right. We don't have a a heap of vehicles and various trucks that you like you flatbeds and all that. We have a couple. We will depending on the event, we'll send, you know, smaller vehicles with ⁓ trailers, boats, you know, like the swift water response. But just like doing up big ⁓ like convoy plans and all that sort of thing, that's sort of not really much of a USAR type thing. Swift when we send swiftwater teams somewhere, like they there might be like six vehicles with boats on trailers. Right. So that'd be like our we call ⁓ MRPs or mission ready packages and they can just send out Swift water techs. Yeah. And they'll they'll move it like that. But it's interesting that you guys, I mean, obviously just due to the distance, but you fly everywhere. For our teams, it's like nowadays it's very hard to get that either commercial or military air capability. So we have to drive everywhere. Yeah, yeah. And obviously USA is massive as well. So like I've talked to some of the the guys and they're driving a long way to events. Yeah, you're talking teams from California driving to Florida. Yeah, so it's and they're trying to get there as quick as possible and it's sort of convinced. It's a long way to heard it. Obviously, you know, driving Brisbane to Cairns, that's only two days. Still a distance, but it's only two days. And usually they'll try and get that truck going ASAP while they're still organizing the rest of the people and the other stuff to but we usually fly we'll always fly commercial within Queensland. ⁓ it's generally just international when we ⁓ go military. Gotcha. Are there any tools or techniques that you guys use on your end? That you think would surprise ⁓ you know, rescue technicians over here. We ⁓ we get issued a kangaroo that you ride. I heard I heard that. Yeah, that's a story. I heard that. There's a course. Yeah. Tactical kangaroo course. Yeah. Yeah. You've done it. Yeah. ⁓ ahead. Obviously I haven't been deep enough in the US teams to know the various the only teams I can compare really to are Virginia and LA County. 'cause they're the insurar activity you guys are but in that regard we're almost the same as them really. That's an international cash, isn't it? And all in a sense. There's like a hundred and eighty something guidelines insurar guidelines that you've got to meet, which vary in not just operational capabilities and all that, but it like I said about the you know, vaccinations and having someone who speaks English or Japanese or, you know, whatever. I guess skills wise, yeah, without knowing enough about what you guys do. I'll think about it and if something pops up. Well, then we'll have to start a USAR exchange program and I'll come train with you guys. How about that? And we'll learn we'll learn more about that. Everyone heard it here. What do you think what is something that we as USAR technicians don't train on enough? Or even in the tech rescue side. Ooh. You should have sent me these questions before, you know? No, this is exactly why I don't send you these questions. But we don't train enough. I think there's so much there's so much in the tech rescue world that you sort of can't narrow down you you almost a broad Yeah, it's like information overload. Jack of all trades, master of none, that you sort of the way our training in logbook is set up is that you'll go over everything a bit. Like obviously you d when you're doing workshops, you're concentrating heavy on something for that year or whatever. ⁓ like the instructors will always set up the workshops so okay, we haven't done focus on this, you know. like sufforta rigging from a boat or you know lowering a rescue from a boat, that sort of thing. So they'll do a workshop series on that. But then two years later they'll mock up some other things. I it's it's such a broad area. It's a tech reserve so involved that you unless you sort of can put all your time into it, like it is just it's huge. I I fully agree with you. It it's very and especially on like the company level side, trying to to plan training, it's like yeah. It there's just so much coming at you and it's just hard to like I that's why you have to come up with a plan and and try and follow it the best you can. And like I still struggle with that too. Yeah. On our on our planning side at this at the company level, it's just like you're looking at a mountain of information that you have to continually train on. Yeah. And it's just and obviously there's not there's not the budget, there's not the funding, there's not the sometime people aren't in, people are on vacation, so it it gets it gets complicated. Yeah. Do you have like the workshops of the in or is that what you'd call your ModX? Well, so we ⁓ we have ⁓ like our our monthly drills and even that there's things that you might go in and it's not you're not working with your rescue discipline. Maybe it's a team wide PowerPoint on, you know, working in a contaminated environment, but that's a that's a box that the team has to check for the year. So there are varying reps where you don't work on something for a long time, or maybe there's a You know, the team has a Swiftwater team, but like I'm not on the Swiftwater team yet, even though I Swiftwater certified, it's just steps that you have to take. Yeah. So you have to continually, continually keep training and, you know, build towards that if that's something you want to do. Yeah. So we I mean we we talked a little bit about the NSROG side, but would you just give us a quick overview? We'll get into the the international deployments. What is NSROG and and how do you guys fit into that capability as Aussie One? Yeah. So NSROG is ⁓ international search and rescue advisory group. which is under the banner of the UN, UN OCA, which is a standards I guess you've got your FEMA standards for the FEMA teams. In Saraga's standards for teams that can deploy internationally and they've got to meet certain benchmarks of bearing so a heavy task force has got a yeah, I think it said it was a hundred and eighty something guidelines or boxes to tip, which ranges from being able to do four hundred mil cuts or whatever, ⁓ having one vaccinated, having incident management capability, avert rescue capability within the USA function. And so the way teams are classified, so Queensland's team is OS One, as I mentioned, 'cause we got classified first in Australia. And that was two thousand and eight. So teams will sort of spend quite a few years building their capability and 'cause you've got to have, I think it's at least two deep. Like so a task force is seventy five people, you've got to have two at least two deep as far as I'm aware. And so it takes quite a number of years for ⁓ a fire department to get to that. that level and obviously a lot of funding and yeah, we're lucky we get federal funding for that. And then to get classified, you get booked in to do a OEC, so international external classification, where Insurarg assessors from around the world will come in and they'll their special one guy's specialty will be the j logistics function, one will be the rescue, one will be the management, one will be the medical. And they are literally just honing in on that function as it goes throughout the three day exercise or whatever it is and making sure you tick all these boxes and basically you get if you get all greens, you're obviously sweet. You've you've smashed it. Doesn't happen. There's always some yellows. And probably a good thing because if you got all perfect, well, what do you gotta do next time? You gotta go perfect. But Exactly. A few yellows, you know, is okay. But ⁓ obviously any reds is no good. That's sort of like a And if you were if if Aussie one wasn't certified with like us to step in and try and take that role from you or how would that what would they look for to to try and fill that that gap? Well, 'cause they got certified I think four years after us, like they were sort of building up similar time. And obviously this is the first couple of years I got in the job. So and that was probably another reason why I was attracted to it. Seeing this whole Y U C this USAR classification exercise was a huge event. Like it's years in the planning. So they were also building up their capability at the same time. And the way it worked Once they got well, even before they're qualified to be honest, we sort of we do a three monthly on call rotation. So for the first three months of the year, Oz two are on call for any deployments if some something happens internationally and want to send a team, they'll go and then when we're next three months we're on call. Yeah, it's sort of back and forth like that. So it's not really trying to steal each other. We we definitely work together a lot because we're we're doing the same. Right. But if you for whatever reason, if OS one didn't get evaluated or didn't pass that evaluation, would the burden just fall on OS two until Os Os one was able to get back up to that capability? Or do you think that's just not that's not a reality and that you guys get that evaluation? They're not gonna there's such a big financial cost to do a an IEC ⁓ and then an IER, an I reclassification is every five years. Same thing, same dick. Okay. I don't think there was ever we're pretty not blowing smoke up at our house. I don't know if you heard that, but I've heard that. Alright. So we're pretty well regarded around the in Sarag world, both Aussie teams. Just 'cause we've always pushing the benchmark and making sure all the skills and everything is up to speed and we're putting on a high quality exercise every year and particularly obviously the five yearly reclassification exercise, which is So have you and you've been on international appointments? Yep. Yeah, I've been on three. And where have you been? Okay. I would would love to know where you've been. So in twenty twenty three we deployed a sort of like a light team almost, only about twenty seven of us, I think, to New Zealand. So this was in February twenty twenty three. The reason we went, 'cause January, February, March, Oz two are first call, they're on on standby. That's when Turkey earthquake happened. So the Australian government sent them to that. If a team deploys, they'll strive by call the other team and say, Are you good to go on standby? Like are you good to go? And you always are. You've always got two cases. You're probably working on one, bringing it servicing, you know, everything, but you're always ready to go. So we were then first call ⁓ and this cyclone was actually meant to come over na Norfolk Island, which is an island sort of not far off or off Queensland coasts. And it was meant to smash that, but it so we sort of mobilised a small team to get ready to possibly go to that. But then it veered away and didn't didn't hit it in the end. But it went straight down sh and cut across the North Island of New Zealand and just smashed from big flooding, lots of damage, like rivers. Elk Valley was just insane. The the damage and the silt built up and houses moving decay down the road, just wiped out. ⁓ quite a few people died and ⁓ so they called us to that. By the time we got there, it was more like a post like damage assessing and still searching structures, secondary searches and all that. And that was, yeah, I think it was twenty seven people. So not not a whole lot of sort of USA tool on the tools type stuff. But that was actually the first deployment we did with our drone capability in USAR. Interesting. Three drone operators on that and they did heaps and that that sort of lifted the whole that draw the drone capability to the forefront. And w and what year was that? Twenty twenty three. Yeah. That's interesting. So you guys fully integrated drones across the task force? Yeah, now do, yeah. That was sort of already starting to happen before then. Post then, it was okay, we need to get definitely more technicians trained because being able to get the drones up and do some mapping or just get to places where you you know, you can't physically get to sometimes. It's the capability is endless. Yeah. And it's so it that's funny just because on the FEMA side, they still haven't fully qualified the drones yet. So you're still technically not supposed to be using them. I I it's coming. It's a thousand percent coming. It's just funny that We're kind of so far behind in that sense. I mean they they are used the state teams use ⁓ for sure. Yeah. ⁓ but that that's interesting you guys and they're what a yeah, what a game changer. Yeah. And ⁓ the intel it can get for the local, you know, the local governments and disaster management groups of what particularly the both before and after, like the mapping of okay, this is what it is now. Like 'cause this this Elk Valley River was the landscape was changed. It completely changed the whole landscape 'cause it was some buildings had The silt buildup was above the roof. Like the houses were swallowed up. It was the the land over there, I think, is quite soft. And all these tre I got got up in a chopper at one point and to fly around damage assessment, but to see all the landslips in all every mountain, every hill, because it's just such soft earth over there. And so a lot of trees in these valleys had full I guess fallen and then gone down into the river and created in some areas created almost like a bund. And then that just spilled through eventually and just went down and wiped out this whole Elk Valley. Yeah. That almost sounds like our hurricane hi ⁓ Helene that came through, like sounds very similar. Yeah. Change like you said, changed the landscape. Yeah. ⁓ it was crazy to see that damage. Yeah. And then the drop you just got a lot of whole good imagery and mapping and yeah. Right. When what changes when you go from a domestic deployment to an international one? Yeah, team side, cash side. So that one And the twenty twenty four PNG one, which I'll get to in a sec. They were both quite small teams and flying commercial, so very limited equipment. Very limited equipment, basically what you could take on a on a commercial airline. So not your typical loading a cache on a truck and going out to the Air Force base. ⁓ you know, we're taking Starlinks, drones, you l leader sentry type equipment. ⁓ Not a whole lot. Like ⁓ obviously New Zealand have they've got a heavy task force team, ⁓ in Surarag classified team themselves. So we sort of integrated with them. So it's not like we didn't have anything if we needed stuff, but it Yeah, you were just augmenting them. Yeah. And it was pretty obvious that it's gonna be like it was after the event that we were getting there anyway. It's more just a they'll be they'll so overwhelmed 'cause they went across the whole North Island that they just needed extra people, I think, and to help with all that part of the you know, start the recovery efforts and that sort of thing. And what was the the P and G thing you mentioned? Yeah, so twenty twenty four, Papua New Guinea, which was just north of Australia, they had a big landslide, like half a mountain just sort of caved away and it covered it buried villages. The whole it was from top to bottom, it was about six hundred meters long this landslide and it happened at I know two two in the morning. And this is in the highlands of Papua New Guinea. This is in it's it's back in time up there. Like seriously back in time. And just covered villages basically, like buried them. And there's boulders that were the size of this room. It was insane. So that was a very because we weren't going right up there with tools and everything and the the government didn't request that. They requested assistance but more so like the technical aspect of mapping and drones and ⁓ helping with the recovery. As it turns out, so I went on that one as a drone operator because by then I was the pilot and I don't know how much you know about Papua New Guinea. It's a pretty dangerous place. Like Australians who work there are generally live in compounds and that sort of thing. Is it you know there's a lot of violence and gang violence and it's it's like going back in like I it's going going back in time, it was so sorry to cut you off, but you just that that brought up a good point is like what even here domestically when these FEMA teams travel, they have force protection with them. So they'll have a a government agency like a law enforcement agency, ⁓ How does that work overseas? Do you guys travel or were you are you paired with some sort of law enforcement entity? Depends where we're going. Like the New Zealand one, we went. Obviously the local police are here and there and everywhere. They were Right. But Papua New Guinea, we s we also took a agency from a a person from D Fat and a person from NEMA, our national emergency management agent wi agency, which they oversee our basically our safety lot. They do their risk assessment. Okay, can we go here? Can we go there? And Do the background, there's obviously a whole lot going on in the background with that. ⁓ with back to Canberra. ⁓ so we had one guy from there with us and he was ex Special Forces army like so super switched on guy. Wait, are we I was there? No, I said switched on. ⁓ sorry. Continue. Well, for instance, one area we investigated that we could maybe stay closer to the landslip site. He got all we did sort of bit of intel and went and had a look and got all the info back to this is probably day two. Got the info back to Canberra and Canberra knocked it on the head and said, No, we're not having our Australians staying in that town 'cause there's history of violence, there's yeah, machete violence and gun violence. It's generally all the tribes fighting each other, but there's just too much security risk. So We were actually staying in Port Moresby, which is the capital, right down the bottom, and we were getting on an air force plane every morning, flying up to a remote airfield, Wappa Amanda it was called, landing there and then getting a chopper into sight. So every day and then out and then in and then out. Just 'cause they couldn't risk That's a long day. Yeah, they couldn't risk us staying up there. For two nights towards the end of it, I think we're there for ten days. For two nights towards the end of it they did happen to get the okay to put us up at a town called It'll come me. I forgot. ⁓ a little bit closer, but still quite like a chopper ride was probably forty minutes to get there, but it was quicker than hopping on a plane and then a chopper. But otherwise, yeah, we're flying via the I went on more Australian Air Force planes that ten days than I had in my whole RAF career. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, I was on the first chopper in to sight, so we're flying over this area and there's a humongous landslide and people like these locals, indigenous locals everywhere, thousands of ⁓ We land in this spare paddock and there's thousands of these people. We had local Papua New Guinea police there and military, 'cause that's we didn't have our police or anything like that. We sort of landed I think the first day we landed right in the middle, basically, and we never felt threatened or under threat, but they're just curious. They don't speak English. They speak pidgin. And they'd probably never seen a helicopter land in their town before. And definitely hadn't seen these things that we were putting up, the drones. Yeah. But yeah, literally when we we landed and sort of met the I guess you call the elder or the chief of the that tribe, there's straight away you're just surrounded by all these people just right here. They're just looking at you because they're just curious. They're like, Who are these people? But they I think they they knew were there to help 'cause, you know, a lot of ⁓ had lost lots of family members members under Did you did you have to dig through that to find people or what was the task? Just damage assessment? 'Cause ⁓ yeah mapping and needs assessment for, you know, what the humanitarian response needs to be. Cause they we got there two or three days after. I I can't remember my head. ⁓ they were already digging them s they had their own sort of rosters going. Well and this is just villagers. This is there's no work shifts around these just people with shovels and some of the some of the things they'll digging, you're like, ⁓ you just Yeah. Yeah. Just unsecured trench. Yep. It's like it's not we're we're not telling them sort of what they're doing. But so we weren't needing we weren't sort of there for that. It's sort of about yeah, the mapping and and then eventually it turned it sort of took s it basically turned into more of a humanitarian mission 'cause there was so much humanitarian humanitarian aid coming in, like from Oz aid and USAID, 'cause that was still on back then, Japan. We were sort of as part of flying up every day, we'll also unloading planes full of all this humanitarian equipment and helping the logistics side of getting it up there 'cause it was such a even from the airfield we landed in, it was still like a two or three hour drive from there up through these lands and initially I haven't struggled with just logistically making things happen and just a sort of typical back not backward country, but ⁓ there's not much infrastructure. Infrastructure. So and we had Australian army people there, ⁓ Air Force and us working in with them to try and, you know, alleviate those logistical hurdles. And in the end summer team like I was obviously doing lot of of flying the drones every day. ⁓ a lot of the other team end up help set up all these huge camps with the big humanitarian tents and showing the local leaders, you know, how to do all that, manage all the the food stock coming in because there's thousands of people here and who are who they need. They've lost family members, they've lost their housing, their shelter. So it was it was an incredible experience. I'll when I flew in that first chopper, it was like I'd just gone to another world. It was it was crazy. Wait when you get when you get to another country, I mean there or anywhere, what is the biggest challenge when you are arriving on the ground? Well obviously that one was the transport of getting to site. Getting to site is always gonna be a hurdle because depending on the damage of where you are. We've got partners in D FAT, that's a D FAT ⁓ contract, a logistics company. It it used to be Palladium, it now it's TetraTech, but they're basically contracted by D FAT to do humanitarian logistics capability. And their job is to basically source those needs as soon as it looks like they're sending a team, a USAR team, they'll send a couple of reps forward or they'll deploy with us. They'll they'll with us on that one. And their job is to try and figure out those, okay, what transport are we got, what accommodation we got, what food, ⁓ what else do we need to try and alleviate that sort of thing, like in ⁓ already jumping ahead, but to the Vanuatu one, how are we going to get our cache from the airport to where we're setting up our base of operations, ⁓ that all that that's obviously the I think the the transport of moving everything from your your entry point. To where you're gonna be working or staying or that's probably a bit of a hurdle, but we're lucky we've got other areas from the Australian government who help with that, essentially. So in Ulan, I mean obviously there might be other NSRAG teams there. You mentioned, you know, the the Fairfax County. What is that what does that coordination look like on the ground when you have these multiple teams coming together? Yeah, so they've got what they call a UCC, a USAR coordination cell. That's part of the INSIRAG network, I guess. That every team has to have some a certain amount of people on that team qualified in how to run that. So if you're you could be first into a country and you're at the point of entry, you're setting up a USAR coordination cell, like and you're dropping two of your people there or four straight away. You might be then going three hundred, four hundred kilometres away to where the actual earthquake or whatever is hit. So New Zealand and Papua New Guinea didn't really have that 'cause it wasn't multiple USAR teams. New Zealand there was their team and our team, but it was locally ran as more of a you know a local incident almost. ⁓ so they had their normal incident management teams, not so much a USAR coordination cell 'cause it wasn't like they had twenty USAR teams to manage, like say Turkey, for instance, they obviously had teams from all over the world, non classified teams just turning up wanting to come and help. Yeah. And they had to turn some a away 'cause end of the day they might be a burden, not, you know, help 'cause of the very exactly or the lack of, you know, infrastructure and logisc logistics they've got behind them. Do you feel that I know every all these NSROG teams are evaluated so d when you end up working with another team from another country, do you see any differences still in tactics and standards? Are you guys all s pretty much on the same plane because of that evaluation? It's pretty well a sa a similar plane. There's always always gonna be differences, but because there's all those benchmarks you have to hit, which covers a lot of our oper talking operations now, that everyone's gotta hit these various benchmarks that it's gonna be and it's designed that way to be hopefully very s not seamless, but that you can integrate to other teams and know the language you speak and know the you know, the PSAR markings or whatever you you're all on the same standard. So that's the beauty of I guess in Sarag that it is these are the hundred and eighty something guidelines you have to tick if you want to be a classified team. A are you guys using survey one two three on international deployments? Yep. 'Cause what we did in Battle A two last or eighteen months ago. 'Cause that we'll obviously go back to our incident command centre in country, but also back here. Like in our our state fire control centre will be stood up and they'll be monitoring everything from back here. So I'm just trying to think Papua New Guinea. Well there wasn't infrastructure, it was you know, huts and it was more about the mapping of the drones 'cause the earth was moving every day. This so I'm getting sidetracked again, but the earth was recognised that one day, like the first day we got on ground and went and did some initial flights and we couldn't The first day we were on the ground for maybe three hours 'cause it the chopper pilot said we need to go 'cause the weather comes in hard up in those highlands. Yeah. And it's very el ⁓ the elevation is probably okay, feet. more math. Nine thousand feet or something. That's pretty hot. Okay. Yeah. So Mount Hagen, one of the ones we fly over, that's four thousand meters, that's like twelve thousand feet. Jeez. The site wasn't that hot, but that's one that mountains but The ho the further up there on Highlands, it's quite high. So yeah, we sometimes we had to like we'd get a call on the radio, you need back at base ro well, you need to get back to the evacuation point 'cause we need to get the chopper out in the ten minutes 'cause they're stressing about the weather. So so going back yeah to the first day when we turned up and then came back the next day, you could see that Earth had moved, sorry, like a big chunk and you're like No way. This thing's still moving and it's ⁓ unstable. You could see Just looking at it, I'll send you some pictures. ⁓ and so it became very much a get up there, get the drones up, see what like on this ledge above where we were sort of flying from, this cliff, there was a big crack in the ground, and one of the guy the other pilots said one of the other drone pilots said that has gained like a meter in what width this crack. So we're sort of thinking this whole cliff ⁓ basically above the road we're operating from could come down. So we had to sort of basically evacuate everyone, okay, further yonder back. Five hundred metres okay that way. So don't know where I was going with that, but ⁓ Yeah. It was still interesting either way. Yeah. Well I'll I'll ask you this. I'll just one, two, three. That's right. For Pap Nick. Right, okay. Yep. But Venom Bartu we were. Okay. What's something about international deployments that people just wouldn't understand unless they've actually been there? Well, you've been in the army. Obviously there's something this you wanna do it. You wanna get that sense of representing to go. That's more the reward side of it. So for instance, Vanuatu, that was the first time we've actually sent a heavy cache on an international deployment since twenty eleven. There was a lot of years where D Fat didn't send either team sort of to anything for whatever reason, to you know, politics. So deploying that heavy cache at a moment's notice and going into this new country and trying to set up and orientate yourself and get teams out doing recon in thirty four, thirty five degree heat, a hundred percent humidity, like Vanuatu, like Pacific Islands in December. The conditions there were the most insane I've ever worked in. Papua New Guinea was hot, brutally hot. This was next level. This was and I was in the logistics team for Vanuatu. I was lot head of logistics. I'll have my ass hanging out for the whole deployment. Eighteen hour days. And it's good weight loss, good fat camp, 'cause like ⁓ the conditions there, yeah, I guess the conditions would be the most but that's not just International diplomats don't just have that. Internal diplomats get the same sort of thing. That's probably something off the top of my head I can think of. But No, that may I mean and especially in a in the fact that you're in another land as well and it's just another thing that you have to deal with on top of that. And integrating into their sort of teams like you know to their the Vanuatu military force or the local local rescue teams or the ad hoc rescue teams culture, like making sure you're not being inappropriate to you know the local. So that's a good that's a good point. Is what are the biggest friction points internationally when you're trying to integrate with these different teams and cultures. Culture is a big thing. And we have to do training on that ⁓ as part of our ongoing USA training. And so for Papua New Guinea for instance, we weren't allowed to send any females on our team for that one. The government said no females because it's super dangerous. Super dangerous for ⁓ especially white females. So there was none on that. And obviously we always trying to have females on our team 'cause they're good operators and all that. But so that was probably a big cultural thing for that one. Interesting. Vanuatu. Yeah, the culture, I guess the same. Obviously dealing with local families who have lost a lot, you know, trying to be sensitive to their their plot. I wasn't outside outside the why so much at Vanuatu 'cause I was at the base of operations ⁓ most of the time. So I was sort of working quite a lot with the local military force. The got we end up staying on a base essentially. Outside we set up our tents and everything, but we're sort of in a semi secure compound. But Vanuatu wasn't as sort of as much a security threat as Papua New Guinea. But you still still gotta have your wits about you and ⁓ have our ⁓ you know accountability and all that sort of thing. So probably just integrating to their local teams and but that was also probably the most rewarding of of that, to be honest. And they were super they helped us that week That we only went to Vanuatu for a week. That was the b easy, the busiest week of my whole career. But also probably the most rewarding just 'cause what we had to do and get done, particularly coming back. 'Cause it's two days before Christmas too. So the sort of pressure was on to get the case out and the people out. And it was let me in the last in twenty four hours basically we had to configure the cache in a completely new configuration for different aircraft. We've knit it up. That's perfect. It was That's perfect. It was like, let's go, we're doing this and I'm not ⁓ ripping my hair out. That yeah, 'cause you're in charge of it all. Yeah. And on the plane we've never put it on. Yeah, exactly. That's p that's perfect. So what on these international deployments, what tends to to break down? I mean, gear, communication, like what is the thing that's like just becomes a s a you know, a slog to get through. Yeah. Or to deal with. I think comms is always an issue. That's in that's in every part of Fire Center. That's in yeah. Yeah. I we can't even talk to each other across town on the radio. Yeah. Yeah. So there's always those issues. ⁓ and obviously with that that brings like say Vanuatu for example, that's that brings security risk. Like ⁓ do we have contact with the teams at the Ford, you know, at the at the pile, so to speak. ⁓ making sure that you can get hold of ⁓ Obviously we're getting more and more Starlink top stuff, which helps with very big. Although some countries it's still banned. Interesting. So you can't bring the Starlink with you? Yeah, some. Yeah. Vanuatu could. So that was yeah, worth its weight in gold. But we're still getting more of those actually a year was it a year? No, maybe like three months after Vanuatu we went out bought like twenty Starlink minis 'cause we've realized not just internationally but internally how worthy they are. I it it's the same here. I think the I don't believe they're on the FEMA cash yet, but I I think most teams have them and it will be it'll be one of those things in the future that if you don't have it you are Yeah, you're what you're you're woefully underprepared. Actually that's a big difference too. What is ⁓ you mentioned that the cache list, cash list. Y the FEMA and the FEMA teams are 'cause I've did that USA logistics course, I saw the card. Yeah, it's very rigid. It's very rigid. We sort of don't we can almost not do what we want, but explore different ⁓ tools or various equipment as long as we go through our obviously our normal procurement and all that sort of procedures 'cause we're government. But we're not sort of restricted to this. But it's just gotta be able to meet these standards of whatever it's gotta do. So I'll find a big thing. That's very interesting. Actually, yeah. That yeah. And that I think ours like it is a process. You have to go through this huge bureaucratic process to get a small like a Starlink on that preferred or to even get something taken off the list. Yeah. And it's the same it's the same process. Yeah. What do you think or what was a hard lesson that stuck with you from a deployment? Well a hard lesson. Yeah, you after something you Or you you remember it's just the good stuff, you block out all the bad stuff. Like that was like my time in the army. Yeah, like I guess for like say Vanuatu, 'cause that's the most recent one, just getting probably lo getting resources which obviously when the whole town is well the whole si island is devastated, you're sort of trying to get resources 'cause you're the you're logistics and you you need to get things, but getting certain items proved very hard because you also don't want to flush out everything and take away from the locals, w that's not what we're what we aim to do at all. We're we aim to be self sufficient completely well completely to an extent. You know, we can't take we can't take thousands of litres of fuel and that sort of thing. So probably just that'd be one lesson from that week. You know, it all sort of happened so quick and was so just mind blowing, busy long days and by the time we're sort of establishing the setup, we're almost starting to wind back down because they realize that it wasn't as bad as they thought. Because we When we deploy it's gonna be up to fourteen days. Okay, I was gonna ask you that because we're that's similar as well, it's fourteen days. That's a standard sort of use ⁓ international response will be fourteen days. Obviously that can get extended varying circumstances, but so sort of within a f few days of being there, we'll okay, I think we're they're gonna send us home. So actually ⁓ probably a big lesson was that we had not drilled loading our cache onto a civilian aircraft, onto a cargo plane. 'Cause for whatever reason they couldn't get the Australian Air Force, their C seventeen for to get us back. So the government back here or yeah, the logistics partner to the government had to source a like charter two planes, one a for the people and one for the cache. And it's twenty twenty two tonne worth of worth of equipment. It's it's eight eight aircraft pallets in a C seventeen and seventy five people. Obviously you can't put that on one commercial plane. So yeah, that whole I guess that's easily the biggest lesson that I Yeah. You learned that on the fly. On in twenty four hours and ⁓ I was lucky though, one one of the well there's two people from the humanitarian logistics capability that were with us, a guy and a girl, and ⁓ Leah, she was extraf or still is ex part time Air Force reservist in air movements who they that's their job is to load, you know, pallets for C seven eight. Load masters. I worked closely with her that week. Like I think that in that last day, the last twenty four hours, I counted the next day we had I it was like fifty something phone calls to each other through obviously ⁓ the Starlink, but 'cause she was sort of down at the at the airport and I was back at the base and we didn't have big trucks. It like literally, okay, build a pallet, like a a normal pallet, not an aircraft pallet. Get it okay, I'm gonna prioritize, put that truck on there 'cause then Leah's gonna sort of put that in it was a whirlwind, man. It was unbelievable. Particularly that we that's the fun truck. That's logistics. Yeah. So that was a huge actually, yeah, that was a huge learning curve having to do that. in ⁓ basically on twenty four hours notice. Yeah. What ⁓ this I'm gonna go completely the opposite on here. What do you think separates a good rescuer from a great one? So you from me. Or like a rescue technician, like what what is it what is that defining item that makes that takes someone from good to great? Well obviously ⁓ everyone has their specialties, I guess. Cause it is such a wide realm, tech rescue. But I think being able to involve you well, this is might be a jargon Being able to involve your team and get okay, he's gonna be good at this. Let's use him. Let's use her or her him for this and just build the team together to get to I that's probably more of a leadership thing as opposed to a ⁓ That is I mean, I I think that counts you being able to understand who's good at what and where to place that. Yeah, and and utilize your strengths and your people. ⁓ that's yeah. That's absolutely a skill. And that's that's something that was hard. That was a lesson for me coming in as a captain on the rescue is like It was hard for me to be like, I feel like I need to know everything and then I finally to take a step back and be like, I don't need to I need to know who knows who knows what. Yeah. And that was an important piece and and that took you can't took a minute for me to process. Yeah. It's too big a scope of of ⁓ tech rescue. It's so big that you you're never gonna be over everything. You're gonna have people who are really good at certain things and you just gotta know those strengths and how to use them to the the best you can. So that's not yeah, that's more probably leadership as opposed to Technician, but I'll I'll let yeah. I'll let you skip by with that one. Thanks. We'll get yes. No, I like this is perfect. I like you were you're on the ropes. What do you think the what do you think the US teams do really well? What's one thing the the FEMA teams do really well? Again, I'm going off fairly limited exposure. See these ones you should have sent to me, 'cause at least I could okay, do a bit of research. Listen, listen. This you're here now. You have to fight through it. 'Cause now it looks like I'm just saying they do nothing good because I'm No, that's not true. Everyone's gonna know that you're really well put together. And I won't edit any of this out, so it's kinda ⁓ good, yeah. This is on the cutting pool. That's a R. It's no, no, it's not. It's not. But I mean you've worked with I mean, you've seen Virginia and LA and you you've worked with them. Was there something that you were like I'm aware of them myself? Okay. But we've sent like our people to assess them or evaluate them or mentor in the lead up to their sort of reclassification. So I'd be sort of speaking on someone else's behalf by going, ⁓ well they did this good or that. I know this is I know ⁓ Americans in general, but also the USA teams, when the outsiders come in, they're like so quickly welcoming and And happy to take you on and show you the ropes and shit like on that course I did, everyone was unreal to me. I was the one outsider basically. I think there was a couple of Canadians and a couple of Koreans, I think, but I was one of the the non Aussie ⁓ the non American USA technician and they were super quick to help me and ⁓ bring me in a cage to explain what's going on here if it was a bit different to what we do or Yeah. I mean I I know I remember I talked to you, I just felt bad for you. That was all. Yeah, yeah. That was ⁓ yeah. I'll let you I'll let you go by with that one. I I have a hot take for though. This is a hot take question. Who's better? Virginia or LA? And you can't say no. You have to you you you have to commit to one. Well, Scott Skimmerhorn was on my course and good dude, I'll go with Virginia. Nice. Safe bet. Safe bet. That's very diplomatic too. ⁓ all right, I'm gonna hit you with some rapid some rapid fire questions. Just whatever comes to you. Yeah. The most overrated piece of equipment. Yeah. I That's fine. Do you guys still use that? No, we don't. It did its job. I rate a piece of equipment. Just in mothballs now? Yeah, ⁓ yeah. They're like a paperweight. Pass. Okay. Most underrated skill. Hey. Most underrated skill in tech rescue. Might have to come back to those. What is one thing every rescuer should master or try and master? The basics. Definitely being on top of the basics all the time. Because there's always gonna be things you fall you fall back on. Yeah, fall short on, sorry, like you 'cause like I've said a heap of times, it's such a big capability that having the basics right that you can still then something comes up that you haven't done for quite a while, you can sort of fum not fumble your way through, but figure it out because you've got the rest of it in the back is you know, you can it's very perishable. Yeah it is very perishable. What's what's one skill that you wish you trained more at? Everything. Podcasts? Podcasts? Yeah. Or saying no to podcasts. No, no, no, no. Never. You gotta. But you're that perfect. Get out of it. So rigging. Get out. See, that's a good that's a good fallback. You can always fall back on rigging. This is I I'll throw you some some some softballs. If you could give one piece of advice to rescuers coming up in the field, what would it be? Lean into the people who have been around for a while. Because obviously over time the knowledge and experience you gain, if you can get some of that out, you'll always pick up little bits that are good from all the various people. Luckily here. Tech rescue's been around f now for twenty odd years, I guess, in our department. For the first few years it was there's a bit of a us and them and it was you know, we got the nickname Tuggers 'cause we're tugging on ropes, tugging on ourselves and I like that, yeah. That nickname is actually that's still called tuggers. But probably Yeah, but a lot of that sort of not animosity is gone. Well, I wouldn't say it's animosity, it's just sort of a bit of us and name that's sort of a lot of that is gone. So ⁓ it's not like a l little clicky club. So you can sort of lean on Well, there's guys who were on it for quite a few a lot of years and who then hand their gear back 'cause they've just had enough. So they're not. But you can still lean on them. They've got they've got years and experience behind ⁓ Just don't be afraid to ask questions. That's that's not just a tech rescue thing. That's a that's anything. Don't ⁓ life that's a life thing. Yep. Where do you see USAR heading in the next five to ten years? For us or in general? For you guys, yeah, but for general, I mean, you've you've travelled and What do you think is coming down the pipeline for use are new technology, anything? Obviously drones, a lot of drones, and that's what my space one doing now. For us, I guess it's geopolitic politically. The Asia Pacific area, we're sending smaller we did send a heavy team to Vanuatu, but we're often sending smaller teams to various things in the Pacific Islands 'cause it's a ⁓ get political, but it's a an influence type thing as well. So like even if in the last I don't know, five years, maybe six years, developed more small teams caches for that sort of thing. Still going via military, so but yeah, teams of twelve or twenty four or that sort of thing with small amount of kit, totally, you know, dependent on yourself, but to get in early, assess, help the local disaster managing management groups and to then if we need more coming in afterwards. For us, I think that's definitely the space our government is going, 'cause like I said, we hadn't sent a heavy task force anywhere since two thousand eleven until we went to Vanuatu eighteen months ago. 'Cause it it is a massive cost, obviously, and a big undertaking, 'cause it's not just our seventy five people and our twenty two tons a year, it's then all the defence force and then all the D FAT people in the NEMA and like there's a as you know, there's so much going on in the background that we don't see it. So more sort of niche small teams, I think, for us. Yeah. No, I I think and I and our side there is a Especially with all the the turmoil and bureaucracy in Washington with FEMA, there's been a like I said, a rise of those state teams and they bring a lot of capability, quick capability as to where FEMA can have that sort of prolonged presence in a disaster zone. So th it'll be interesting to see where that sort of goes over the next five to ten years and how these teams continue to sort of play out and flush out and and see what happens. Yeah. Yeah. But it's obviously the drones like you mentioned and the Starlink and how those all start to integrate and and and where that ends up. But but hey, I mean I I appreciate you coming on and sharing your perspective. I know I've been chasing you for a while. And ⁓ the little backstory is there was a little ⁓ a little incident this morning where he thought he was gonna get away with with not having to talk to me. But this kind of conversation is is what makes everyone better at their job for real. And you know, for those listening, if you got something out of the episode, share it with someone on your team. This is the Rescue Lab podcast, Tech Rescue Eastar, Real Essence from the Peel. Matt, we want to say thank you very much for for coming on and and sharing your stories with us. And ⁓ we'll definitely see you on the next one. Yeah, for sure. And it wasn't as bad as I thought. Not at all. You did great. So we we appreciate it. ⁓ from the rescue lab. Thank you, my friend. Thanks, Matt.