WA Radio Scanner Users' Group

what is USAR i know it stands for urban search and rescue but just wondering if its a vehicle or a group of vehicles and who mans it

USAR is a very broad area. Every permanent FF is Usar catergory 1 qualified which is basic searching for casualties at an incident. Dont know about vollies quals but I would say that the course would get offered and then they would be qualified exactly the same.

USAR catergory 2 is alot more involved and gets into specialisation such as: Tunneling, shoreing (unsure of spelling) of buildings on collapse, advanced rescue and use of power tools. This is done by the FESA USAR team which comprises mainly of permanent Fire and Rescue Firefighters thgough there are some SES invloved especially with tracking dogs.

They have a USAR truck in Perth FS that is not manned, if they are needed then they are sms'd and they respond. There is also USAR Pods which carries alot of equipment based at the moment at the Forrestfield training centre who also responds when needed.

Every Perm truck has a catergory 1 USAR bag on it for any emergency that its required.

Hope that helps

USAR was called to melville/murdoch and palmyra areas due to trees fallen on houses, structural damage etc.
Perth 3rd was off station and requested to return asap due to one of their firefighters being required to man the USAR truck.
Various BFB stations are now being turned out to the area.

SES have the USAR Cat 1 course available to them. I am qualified in it. USAR you are generally look through rubble etc. Think rescue teams in China during the earth quakes. The people going over the top would be USAR cat 1 qualified. Anyone going into a confined space with either BA sets or with an oxygen line is USAR Cat 2. There are a lot of different things in USAR Cat 2 that you can be.

Spelling is Shoring. Shoring is simply supporting an object, i.e. putting in a prop to prevent a ceiling from collapsing, commonly used in trenches. There used to be a USAR dog, however I believe the member that had the qualified dog has since left the SES. There are a handful of SES that are equipment officers (highest achievable position in USAR for a member of the SES, unless they are also FRS.)