Colorado US&R

A FEMA US&R (Urban Search & Rescue) Task Force is made up of 70 positions. To ensure a full deployment of 70 people, CO-TF1, Colorado Task Force One, has over 180 highly trained members.

Members include firefighters, paramedics, physicians, structural engineers, hazardous materials technicians, heavy rigging specialists, and canine handlers.

The Task Force must be totally self-sufficient for the first 72 hours of a deployment.

Task Force Capabilities

Physical search and rescue operations in damaged/collapsed structures
Emergency medical care for entrapped victims, task force personnel, and search dogs
Conduct damage and needs assessments and provide information to local, state, and federal officials
Assessment and control of gas and electric service to affected structures
Hazardous materials evaluation
Evaluation of the structural hazards in support of rescue operations
Stabilization of damaged structures

Colorado Task Force-1 is made up of personnel representing 28 public and private organizations in Colorado.

View more information on the Task Force

Frequently Asked Questions about the Canines:
Q. How does a dog locate survivors?
A. Uses it’s keen sense of smell and several years of training, to locate the missing scent trapped under the debris. The disaster search dog has so finely honed this training and skill so that it can distinguish between the searchers who are moving above ground and the subjects who are trapped beneath the rubble. Even with all the sophisticated tools used today, the disaster search canine is the most effective tool for locating trapped victims quickly.
 
Q. How many dogs like this are there in the country?
A. Approximately 200, disbursed over FEMA Urban Search and Rescue (US&R) 28 different teams.

Q. How does a handler cope with the devastation and loss?
A. Most find it manageable by concentrating on the job at hand to stay focused and to keep those emotions inside until it is appropriate to let them out and to talk about them with someone trained for critical incident stress debriefing.
 
Q. How does a dog tell if the trapped person is still alive?  
A. The dog uses it’s smell to look for all the scents present on a live human including the exhaled breath.

Q. How many of these dogs will go to a disaster?
A. Each FEMA US&R Team has 4 disaster search dogs that deploy with them.
                                                             
Q. How long can a dog work?
A. The typically work for 12 hours shifts, just like their handler. Sometimes they may be required to work longer periods than that.
 
Q. What happens once a victim is located? 
A. The handler and the rest of the squad accompanying the handler will likely call for these secondary resources to be utilized: Listening devices, Telescoping search cameras, and Medical and heavy rescue on standby to uncover.
 
Q. Do they locate victims that are deceased?
A. The “live find” dog is primarily focused on finding survivors, however, if a handler is tuned into a dog’s body language the dog will probably give some sort of body language or indication that something is there, but the dog will not give his live find indication (which is a bark).

Q. Do dogs get depressed?
A. The dogs pick up on a person’s body language and react to that, but they are not themselves becoming depressed. 
 
Q. How do you keep the dogs motivated to keep searching when they don’t find anyone?
A. The handler will use the technique of hiding a training prop or person and allowing the dog to get it reward for finding.