This Bulletin was received April 10 2015

April 11, 2015

Recently I have received a few questions from the field relating to ICS training. For the uninitiated, this is an emergency management operations doctrine based on the European Military Staff system and widely accepted by municipal and governments for emergency management. One of its benefits is that it facilitatesa common language used in planning, operations, communications, etc. thereby minimizing confusion during intense activities involving many jurisdictions.

ARES under direction from their respective SMs, offers support to municipalities across Canada in providing a back-up communications capability for the municipal emergency management team. Some of these municipalities or served agencies use ICS and where that exists, there could be a request that ARES radio operators be trained at least to the ICS-100 / 200 levels in order to be familiar with its concepts. RAC does not have the resources nor is it structured to offer in-house ICS training. However, there is a detailed description of ICS and were training may be located across Canada, on line.

SMs this is information for you to pass along to your STCs and SECs and municipal contacts if they should inquire.

The ICS web site is www.icscanada.ca and is in PDF format for easy download.

You are encouraged to visit this site and share this information both internally and externally with your served agencies.

Bill Boskwick RAC CEC, VE4BOZ
CFSO