Bart Heads Back to Missouri

May 24, 2011

Code 3 Associates has been requested by the state of Missouri and Humane Society of Missouri authorities to deploy to the Joplin area to assist with anticipated community wide post-storm search and rescue. BART and the core team left Longmont early this morning, and an additional team from the Kansas City area has been on the ground since this morning doing assessments.

Stay tuned for pictures and more information!

Winding Down in Missouri - Gearing Up to Head South

May 11, 2011

The team spent much of its time speaking with local residents about pre-event evacuation for themselves and their pets. We also transported animals out of potential impact areas for those residents that were evacuating and didn't have a means to transport the animals themselves. We had overwhelming support and gratitude from residents for assisting them with their animal evacuations.

Code 3′s response teams have extensive technical training and field experience, which led to a request from local Emergency Management to integrate with human rescue teams in the event of levee failure that would have necessitated human evacuation and rescue.

Code 3 wishes to give special thanks to the Kennett Fire Department Station 2 for allowing our field responders to use their shower facilities and station while we were staged at the Delta Dunklin Fairgrounds.

Now as the event winds down in Caruthersville, and the rising floodwaters threaten communities further south on the Mississippi, BART and Code 3 teams are poised to continue our support of communities affected by this disaster. Volunteer rescue teams, in addition to those already assisting, have been placed on standby in the event this disaster escalates.

A reminder for residents along the Gulf and Atlantic Seaboards, as we enter the 2011 hurricane season, to be diligent and safe in the even a storm makes landfall. Code 3 Associates is always a resource to assist those jurisdictions if affected.

Look for future updates on this and future events! Thanks for following our news from the road, and as always your support is appreciated as it allows us to respond to the needs of communities affected by disasters.

More News from the Mississippi River – Caruthersville, MO

May 10, 2011

As mentioned in last week's post, Code 3 has partnered with the ASPCA Investigations and Disaster Response staff to once again help the residents of Caruthersville, Missouri. This is not the first time Code 3 has been in Caruthersville; in 2008 Code 3 partnered with Missouri Humane to assist in evacuation of animals for what was historic flooding in that year.

We are back again… Caruthersville has built a new levee system only to find that the river crest of 48.6', a new record level, might come over the new levee. Seep water, a hazard of river levees and people living close to the levees, is forced into the ground, under the levee system, and surfaces on the other side of the levee as very soft area. These areas can show up as water seeping from the ground or as what they call a blowout, where the water is shooting out of the ground. The force of the water can also break sewer lines and water lines causing additional dangers to residents and rescuers.

These are some of the conditions we saw when we arrived in Caruthersville on May 2.

On May 3, Code 3 began work assisting the Caruthersville Humane and the Caruthersville Animal Control evacuate animals from Caruthersville and the Pemiscot County area near the levees.

On May 6, teams had evacuated 467 animals from the Caruthersville area, this included 12 horses, dogs, cats, birds, guinea pigs, and wildlife (injured turtle, injured heron). These animals were then transported to the Kennett Fair Grounds, in Kennett, Missouri to a temporary shelter.

On Sunday May 8, at the request of the Caruthersville Operations Center, Code 3 assumed the animal control duties for the area, to give local staff a day off. After the crest of 48.1' on Sunday and the lifting of the curfew, some animals began to be reunited with their humans.

Code 3 teams transported 7 horses back to their owners, and 19 cats to an owner that had no way to come and get her animals. By 6:00pm Monday, May 9 some 140 animals had been released back to owners and teams are expecting that by 6:00pm Tuesday May 10, there will be far fewer animals in the shelter.

Code 3 and our teams would like to give Karol Wilcox, and her staff a job well done. The evacuation plan for Caruthersville, and Pemiscot County was a complete success, and was executed perfectly.

Kurt Cruickshank
Director of Field Operations

BART and the Code 3 Team in Missouri

May 5, 2011

BART and the Code 3 Associates team are currently in Caruthersville, Missouri assisting with animal rescue and recovery in the wake of flooding along the Missouri and Tennessee border.

Bart and two Code 3 water rescue teams, whose members are from Colorado, Kansas, South Dakota, Iowa and Minnesota, are responding at the request of local emergency management and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). The request was received on Sunday evening, and BART was on the road just a few hours later.

Code 3 is working in cooperation with the ASPCA at the direction of local emergency management along the Missouri Tennessee border.