Operation Magpie

health protection agency exercise

utilising all emergency services to validate the measures in place to deal with large scale decontamination...


50 pound cash award offered for a days participation...

my source is a firefighter who has refused to take part...

the drill is ineffective...

all sites have been pre planned...to appear like a well run exercise

this is a con job- an operation...basically an new labour ADVERT...


IN REALITY:
if a WMD goes off in reality there is no real equipment to deal with
the situation properly...

There are concerns:

personell beleive that insufficient and adequate training to promote confidence
and safe handling of the aplliances and the equipment in the time allocated

changes in operational procedure to accomodate the plan
relaxation of certain trained procedures which would compromise the safety of workers

lack of adequate communications equipment

lack of adequate Breathing Apparatus[BA]

risk of personal injury due to civil unrest

lack of equipment and appliance yesting and recording procedures of CCBRN equipment
[conventional, chemical, biological & radiological nuclear incidents]

Risk of commiting Female firefighters to radiation incident

lack of welfare planning and organisation of releif personnel leading to fatigue

the draw on the different areas would deplete cover in there own district/region

the responsibility should be borne by another organisation

there will be convoys of emergency services
sent down motorways...from different regional authorities
Firefighters with years of experience to be left out of the loop
-no real communication structure...
with the army to run operations via the police...throught to firefighters


firefighters will just be given a sleeping bag and told to
join a line to be ferried to incident...
without detailed knowlegde of incident

NO INSURANCE for workers / families