Lifesaving Hazmat Gear Leaves Denver For DC

DENVER -- Employees of the National Medical Response Team Central (NMRT) fear a government plan to move life-saving emergency medical equipment from a Denver warehouse to a storage facility near Washington, D.C., could cost lives in the event of a national disaster in the western region of the United States.

The NMRT is deployed as a back-up resource to local law enforcement agencies during disasters and has responded to such events as hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the 1996 Olympic Park bombings. The team was on stand-by during the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver.

The NMRT website calls the federal team “the only response team in the system that has the ability to be ‘wheels up’ on commercial aircraft in four hours.” According to employees, there are only a handful of military assets that can deploy faster than NMRT.

But employees said the rapid response time could change when the Department of Public Health and Human Services (DPHHS) removes NMRT’s equipment cache, including high-tech chemical air monitors and advanced hazardous materials suits, from its Denver warehouse next week. In a statement, DPHHS spokeswoman Gretchen Michael said the government is moving the cache “for rehabilitation and to re-outfit the cache to enhance preparedness and response to the central corridor of the United States.”

But employees, speaking under condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, told 7News they feared the move would have the opposite effect, slashing hands-on training at the Denver facility and handicapping the team’s response times.

“Ultimately time equals life,” said one senior NMRT employee, who worried that precious hours would be lost if equipment had to be deployed separately from the east coast during a west coast disaster.

With some equipment expected to be permanently stored in the east coast facility, the senior NMRT official said response times could triple.

“This is a cost-saving measure that will potentially cost lives during a disaster,” the official said.

Michael disputed that the move is a cost-cutting measure, saying in a statement, “This isn’t an issue of cost. Rather, it is about being able to effectively respond to an event.”

She acknowledged that response times could hit 12 hours.

“We deploy our teams as quickly as is feasible and our standard is to deploy within 12 hours of being activated,” she said. “We are constantly striving to improve our response times and optimally a 4 hour response time is a goal to be obtained.”

Michael pointed out that many local law enforcement agencies have developed their own hazardous materials programs and do not need to rely as heavily on federal hazmat resources like NMRT.

She said repurposing NMRT’s equipment would not impact hands-on training programs.

“Training can occur anywhere,” she said. “The team trains with equipment throughout the country. We also fly equipment to the NMRT for their trainings.”