08/03/2025
Copied from another group but contains valuable advice and information for all groups.
Pertaining to Texas Disaster and Texas SAR Community.
**JULY 4TH | A MESSAGE TO THE SEARCH & RESCUE COMMUNITY**
I want to take a moment to acknowledge the Search and Rescue teams—both professional and volunteer—who answered the call. You witnessed and endured experiences that most people will never face in their careers. Your courage, resilience, and dedication do not go unnoticed.
As someone who could not respond directly, it was extremely difficult to decline deployment. Despite receiving multiple requests, I made the responsible decision to stay back, even though my K9 has had multiple certifications as well as finds, his last certification is expired.
Instead, I supported the response in other ways—through calls, texts, Facebook messages, and in-person conversations with firefighters, divers, K9 handlers, searchers, victims' families, and law enforcement agencies. I listened to their experiences, their frustrations, and their trauma.
Of the more than thirty people I spoke with, one consistent message came through:
**It was chaos.**
The chaos is not to be blamed on any single group or individual. However, I can offer specific advice to the Search and Rescue community that may help reduce this kind of confusion in the future and improve coordinated response.
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# # # **What Needs to Happen Moving Forward**
To my colleagues in volunteer Search and Rescue: your skills are invaluable. You bring essential knowledge and experience in wilderness search, lost person behavior, and cold cases. But before responding to a large-scale incident, I urge every team to consider the following:
1. **Understand and implement NIMS command.**
It is not just a training requirement—it is a system that must be practiced and followed. For NIMS to function properly, you must go through the appropriate channels. Without structure and coordination, the system breaks down.
2. **Take the TEEX Wide Area Search class.**
This course should be considered a baseline requirement for deployment to large-scale or mass-casualty incidents.
3. **Coordinate with your local Office of Emergency Management (OEM).**
Your local OEM needs to know your team’s capabilities before a disaster occurs. Building that relationship ahead of time enables them to deploy you through the correct channels.
A good relationship with your county’s OEM liaison can help eliminate rogue requests and confusion about who is requesting a response.
4. **Know your team’s limitations.**
Mass casualty events are not wilderness searches. Be honest about what your team is trained and equipped to handle.
5. **Understand the difference between Wilderness SAR K9s and Disaster K9s.**
These certifications are not interchangeable. A certified wilderness K9 is not qualified for disaster operations without proper additional training and certification.
Understanding this—and having the humility to accept it—is imperative.
6. **Attend a Whole Body Seminar.**
There is a distinct difference between training with dry bone, pseudo scents, and actual full-body remains. If your goal is to assist in recovery operations, this training is critical.
7. **Know who can authorize your deployment.**
As of January 20, 2025, all previous Texas ESF-9 protocols are no longer valid. Updated guidance can be found here:
👉 [TDEM ESF-9 Guidelines](https://www.tdem.texas.gov/preparedness/state-planning)
8. **Engage in joint training with local SAR teams.**
Interagency familiarity and mutual aid agreements are essential. Collaborative training before the disaster reduces confusion and increases efficiency during real events.
9. **GPS and mapping.**
If you do not know how to use a GPS, you need to take a class. The Wide Area Search course covers GPS basics, but individual competence is essential.
Being assigned a search area and not knowing how to interpret or navigate it causes delays and confusion that affect the entire operation.
10. **It’s okay to not be called initially—or to decline the request if it doesn’t come through TDEM.**
Not being activated early does not mean you won’t be needed. If the situation extends into a prolonged recovery or second operational period, there will likely be opportunities to assist.
Wait for the right time—and the right request.
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# # # **On Regulation and Certification**
I used to oppose regulation of who could possess and train with human remains material. However, after hearing a public interview with someone claiming to train hunting dogs at a funeral home—and purchasing pseudo scents and skeletal remains online with no verification of their credentials—I’ve changed my position.
**It needs to be regulated.**
Texas law already provides guidance for the definition of a Search and Rescue Handler:
> **Texas Health & Safety Code § 785:**
> *A Search and Rescue Handler is defined as a person who handles a SAR dog and is certified by the National Association for Search and Rescue (NASAR) or another state- or nationally recognized agency.*
If you or your K9 are not certified as defined in law, you should not have been on that scene. And if certification cannot be verified, incident command has the responsibility to remove unqualified individuals from the operation.
Volunteers must respect state emergency protocols. Failing to do so not only risks operational failure—it risks lives.
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# # # **To the General Public**
Please use discernment when choosing where to donate or offer support. If a person or group is publicly posting about how many victims they found, or sharing videos of themselves in the water with dogs “digging,” consider that a red flag.
No legitimate SAR team conducts themselves this way in public settings or on social media.
Additionally, freelancing and self-deployment—regardless of intentions—create serious issues during coordinated emergency response efforts. This includes firefighters, veterans, SAR teams, and law enforcement personnel.
**Authorization and accountability are non-negotiable.**
In the State of Texas, the appropriate authority after a disaster declaration is the Texas Division of Emergency Management (TDEM). All requests and responses should go through that channel.
Prior to that, the County Office of Emergency Management Liaison should be the one requesting your deployment. Police, Fire, Sheriff's and EMS Should be coordinating request and resources they need through their County's OEM.
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To those who served during this response: **thank you.**
To those who spent years training for moments like this: **thank you.**
To those who showed up and followed proper protocols: **thank you.**
**Stay safe. Stay prepared. Stay professional.**
**GOD BLESS TEXAS**
To support and enhance the state’s preparedness by developing and managing a comprehensive, all-hazards emergency operations plan that clarifies roles and helps coordinate resources before, during and after an incident of state significance.
