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Northwest wildfire crews take expertise to New York By PAUL FATTIG Thousands of dirty, battle-weary firefighters working together for a common cause is a familiar sight to veteran wildlands firefighter Don Ferguson. But that is one of the few "normal" sights greeting Ferguson and fellow federal employees from the Rogue Valley who are part of the interagency Pacific Northwest Incident Management Team 3 providing logistics support to emergency crews in New York City. "I normally don't walk past machine gun pods, past armed FBI agents and those other guys with shiny shoes checking your identification," Ferguson said in a telephone interview Monday afternoon. "Even with our name tags and identification, these guys are taking our cars apart. "Another contrast is the grief and anger that underlies everything," he added. "A wildfire doesn't cause a nation to talk about war." Ferguson, a Bureau of Land Management fire management specialist from the agency's Medford District, is one of seven local federal employees on the 50-member team from the Pacific Northwest. They include Medford District BLM employees Doug Parker, a staff supervisor; Daria Marlow, a computer technician; and Martin Leu, a database expert. Siskiyou National Forest employees include Lance Packer, a transportation expert, and Cindy Wedekind, a supply unit leader. Rogue River National Forest employee Eileen Northrop, a procurement leader, is also on the team. Their mission is to provide logistic support to emergency crews already in Manhattan. They were all working at sites in Edison, N.J. on Monday, about 20 air miles southwest of what once was the World Trade Center. Although the federal teams are set up to respond to natural emergencies, many of those same organizational skills are needed in Manhattan, officials explained. The northwest team is part of 23 different agencies helping the relief work guided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The incident command post is expected to move closer to ground zero in the next day or two, Ferguson said. "Right now, it takes us about four hours to get into town," he said, citing heavy traffic and security. "We're here to support the emergency personnel so we need to move in a little," he added. "We'll probably end up occupying both sides of the Hudson River, using a marine link (a barge) to provide logistics support." Although Ferguson has more than 30 years of wildland fire fighting management experience, this is his first experience with an urban disaster. "A lot of us come from towns where you don't lock your doors," said Ferguson who was reared in the small logging town of Port Angeles, Wash. "You have 81/2 million people here. The environmental hazards are different, the social situation is different." Unlike a wildfire, the disaster is attracting unsavory people intent on taking advantage of those suffering, he said. "This is also the ultimate polyethnic society," he said. "There are a lot of people of Middle Eastern origin living here. I fear for the anger that may be directed at them." But for all his concerns, Ferguson says the system that works for managing wildfires in the Pacific Northwest is working on Manhattan. "What we're trained in is providing support to emergency teams under duress," he said. "It comes down to moving people and equipment through time and space." "But I'd rather have a mountain blow up than this," he added. "I've never thought about applying the incident command system against something so wicked as what happened here." The Pacific Northwest team is expected to work at the disaster site through the end of the month. Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.