IRAN EARTHQUAKE DEPLOYMENT
Interim Report - Iran Earthquake Deployment  

Divisional Officer Peter Crook 

Hampshire Fire & Rescue Service

There will be full reports circulated in due course but I thought I would submit a summary of the team's activities.

The mobilisation was relatively fast with the team in the air only 6 hours after the 'GO'. On arrival at Kerman the RAPID team were almost immediately flown the 200k to Bam and were working about 28 hours after the quake. Unfotunately we waited in vain for another aircraft and 5 hrs later got two coaches and a truck to drive down. This went well for three hours and about 5 miles from Bam when the traffic came to a halt. It then took another 11 hours to get the vehicles through. We slept for the remaining two hours of darkness and then set up camp properly while trying to get a work area allocated by the LEMA.
The combined IRC, BIRD, CANIS and UKFSSART teams were deployed to Zone 5 and spent all day checking buildings and conducting searches where possible live casualties may have been. The team returned to report that they believed all viable sites in zone 5 had been cleared and no live casulaties were found. IRC did conduct a short nightime recce of the same area with the same result.
It was obvious that the type of construction meant that virtually all the buildings crumbled into small pieces and left no survivable voids. All the other international teams working in the other zones reported the same results and the opinion was already that no-one would probably be rescued alive. However we extended the search the next day to other areas and responded to several specific reports of possible live casualties. The same pattern emerged with all alerts proving false with no live rescues made. Although there were rumours of live rescues none of these were confirmed.

A decision was made to accelerate the relief effort and scale down SAR so we prepared to pull out at the end of the 2nd full day of searching (3rd day for RAPID). We departed Bam at midnight on 29th, eventually left Kerman airport at 1410 and arrived back at Stansted at 2230.

The mission failed to carry out any live rescues but nonetheless provided the local population with confirmation of dead relatives and proof that the world cared. They clearly appreciated our efforts and as in other deployments it was humbling for us to be treated so kindly by people who had suffered such a tragedy.

In a miniature tragic replica those of us from Hampshire had the added twist of a former colleague, Gavin Sexton sadly being killed in the earthquake while on the last leg of a world tour. Two BIRD team members uncovered his body and we later realised the connection.

His body had to be buried in Bam but the Hampshire team went to pay their respects at the spot he died and were able to recover his rucksack containing all his belongings. This included photographs, route maps and gifts etc. We have since returned these to his family and informed them of everything we could about his last days. A small but significant help to them which they were extremely thankful for. Perhaps a reflection of the whole mission!
My thanks to the whole UKFSSART team who went and performed very professionally throughout.
Peter Crook - Hampshire UKFSSART Operational Commander for Bam Earthquake Deployment

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