When Unique Challenges Need Unique Responses
The CRASH Team is a brand new, locally driven, emergency response initiative designed for Alberta’s west country & to help respond to its unique natural hazardous and complex emergencies.
The CRASH Initiative’s Goal:
To create the province’s first All-Hazards tactical response team; a team of first responders with specialty skillsets capable of successfully anticipating, monitoring, preparing for and responding to a broad range of natural hazards and complex emergency incidents occurring in a specific region including floods, WUI fires, tornadoes, landslides, severe weather events, mountain rescues, wildlife attacks, and more. CRASH would operate as a small autonomous team, funded via donations and be located in a hazard-prone rural community. They would deploy upon request by first response agencies to assist and bolster existing emergency response resources by increasing their tactical options, response capabilities and effectiveness, responder safety, and operational capacity through use of the team’s specialist equipment and capabilities.
In larger cities, emergency response agencies may have teams of specialists such as hazmat, collapse-zone rescue, high-rise, water rescue, and rope rescue teams that they can access to assist when those skillsets are needed. Out in rural communities, this type of specialized resource is not typically available, or can be requested but may involve a lengthy response time or be unavailable. This is ideally where the CRASH Team initiative comes in - to locate and provide this type of specialist coverage in a region of the province that could benefit from it most. In this way, CRASH does not replace or compete with existing first response services, but only aims to empower them by working directly alongside them (embedded or integrated as a commander sees fit) and using their unique capabilities and resources to enhance the overall response.
Formerly referred to in proposals as the AHTRT - the initiative has rebranded as the Complex Response And Severe Hazards Team (or CRASH Team). After years of pursuing potential government funding for the proposal, we have pivoted towards the charity and not-for-profit route (similar to STARS Air Ambulance’s model) in hopes of raising funding via donations.
CRASH’s Proposed Mandate: CRASH is a team of fire-rescue technical and hazard- specific specialists, dedicated to providing advanced tactical response capabilities during particularly complex, severe, or high-risk emergency situations and events. Situated amoungst the remote, rural and rugged eastern slopes and west country region of Alberta, CRASH supports existing response agencies via immediate deployment of the team upon request of a lead first response agency (Fire, EMS, Police/SAR) to enhanced response capabilities and capacity. On scene, CRASH provides progressive, specialized fire-rescue capabilities, outside of but complimentary to other agencies skillsets, to achieve safe and efficient incident stabilization and successful resolution of emergency situations.
Additional Initiative Details:
The CRASH Team’s intention is to provide a consistent, full-time resource of highly qualified response personnel available as an additional response resource to support existing emergency agencies across the region. Strategically based in the heart of west-central Alberta, the team can respond quickly to requests for additional capacity or specialized capabilities when traditional resources are overextended, face long response times, or encounter large-scale incidents. This centralized location ensures rapid deployment throughout the remote west country region, even under challenging weather, topographic, or hazardous conditions—addressing the current gap where specialized resources are often located hours away and unable to assist effectively.
Inspired by models like STARS, the CRASH Team has become a charity and not-for-profit solution created not to replace existing emergency services, but to work in conjunction with them during the most time-critical and complex calls. CRASH will operate on short-duration, high-impact missions, providing specialized and advanced technical skills and support until the immediate danger is resolved. The focus is on fostering collaboration and leveraging local resources to address pressing emergency response challenges more efficiently and effectively. This will both improve responder safety during particularly challenging events and create solid, mutually beneficial working relationships between local resources and the new specialist CRASH Team.
To succeed, the CRASH Team will rely entirely on strong partnerships with local agencies, community hosts, and the public’s support. Public and private support, whether through collaboration, awareness, or donation, will help ensure the team is trained, equipped, and ready to respond whenever they are needed.
Alberta’s “west country” region
CRASH Team Coverage Area
CRASH’s Intended Services
CRASH aims to staff a team of fully qualified firefighters and rescue specialists to be immediately available within the region to assist with local emergency responses whenever their expertise and skillsets could be useful. This includes when complex or severe emergencies occur, such as:
rapid wildland urban interface fires
tornadoes and severe storms
floods and flash floods
land/rock/mud slides and avalanches
incidents in remote and/or mountainous terrain
multiple casualty incidents
multi-vehicle incidents
building collapses
and advanced expertise is required to improve response safety, capabilities, and patient outcomes.
The CRASH team’s purpose is to maintain skillsets in both professional firefighting and more unique technical fire-rescue disciplines that target specific hazards in the region. More and more frequently, responses complexities and severe hazards require capabilities that go beyond those currently taught in rescue courses, nor readily available in the region.
These skills are often expensive, time-consuming, and complicated for agencies to obtain and maintain. The CRASH Team would intend to be able to offer these capabilities for free to all local resources whenever they are needed most to improve patient outcomes and responder safety.
Additionally, the CRASH Team will strive to offer cross training opportunities to local responders - offering unique training they will find beneficial and not typically have access to anywhere else.
When not assisting with emergency responses, the CRASH Team could be undertaking preparedness and prevention activities within the local region.
The west-central region of Alberta, extending from Watervalley and Bighorn County in the south, to Clearwater County in the north and encompassing the Rocky Mountain Eastern slopes is a vast, remote and topographically dynamic area. It faces nearly every natural hazard present in Alberta and is seeing a surge in tourism, residents, and area users and investors.
This means more people are exposed to severe hazards in the region and are experiencing more complex emergency incidents. More work in local preparedness and proactive empowerment can improve safety and reduce mounting pressures on local public safety services who have to manage these evolving and escalating response situations. This is preparedness work that the CRASH Team could undertake.
More About the Team
Our not-for-profit charity organization will be entirely funded through donations. It will be staffed by local fire-rescue professionals who already serve as volunteer and paid first responders in the community, making them intimately familiar with the region, its challenges, and existing response gaps.
This team would also aim to anticipate, monitor, plan, and train for the specific threats and hazards present throughout the west-central eastern rocky mountain region. They will be designed and prepared to respond immediately upon request to emergency incidents in collaboration and cooperation with existing first response resources to support them, and the public, by putting their unique capabilities to work. They will remain response ready at all times and can respond in a crew apparatus with specialty equipment.
As CRASH is in its infancy stage, there are a number of potential approaches to establishing the CRASH Team. One potential method is for the Team to be “hosted” by a local fire-department; this approach may result in CRASH have use of existing apparatus and equipment, and as a benefit to the hosting department, CRASH members would serve as volunteer members on the fire department (with increased availability) and participate in routine work, responses, and training - sharing their specialties and knowledge.
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