DAC - What Went Wrong?

[00:00:16] to oppose tyranny and fight for the rights are created to bestow us in the United States Constitution.

[00:00:23] We are the Prepper Broadcasting Network.

[00:00:48] And I'm telling you, I look back on the experience and I got a lot of lessons learned.

[00:00:57] Lessons learned.

[00:00:58] When we were at Prepper Camp, we were clueless to all the devastation.

[00:01:04] It was like Prepper Camp was an oasis.

[00:01:10] Yes, we were without power.

[00:01:12] Okay, yes, the cell towers went down.

[00:01:16] But it was a gathering of Preppers.

[00:01:19] We had food.

[00:01:21] We had water.

[00:01:22] We had shelter.

[00:01:24] We had everything we needed.

[00:01:28] And we did not understand the level of destruction outside the camp.

[00:01:35] We just had no clue.

[00:01:38] You know, on Sunday when the lady came to my presentation and started crying that she, her harrowing experience, tried to equate it to everybody in the class.

[00:01:53] We still had no clue.

[00:01:56] Now, what we should have said was, you know, this woman right here is a Prepper.

[00:02:01] She wouldn't have been at Prepper Camp.

[00:02:03] She's prepared more than the average person.

[00:02:08] And this brought her to tears.

[00:02:10] Her experience.

[00:02:12] And it took her two days to get to Prepper Camp.

[00:02:18] That should have been a clue right there.

[00:02:20] But we kind of shrugged it off as, well, you know, you should have had more cash.

[00:02:27] Well, you should have brought more food.

[00:02:29] You know, we just went that route.

[00:02:33] And disregarded.

[00:02:37] It really was and still is unbelievable the amount of devastation.

[00:02:43] I'm thinking about why things are the way they are.

[00:02:49] And I have a number of things I'd like to go over with you.

[00:02:55] Because my second career after the military was emergency management.

[00:03:01] And I did it quite well.

[00:03:04] Every time I left a job, I got a promotion.

[00:03:07] And I retired a GS-14 emergency manager.

[00:03:12] So, I have some experience in this.

[00:03:19] And I see where the failures are.

[00:03:22] Both at the local level, the state level, and at the federal level.

[00:03:29] I see the mistakes that they're making.

[00:03:31] And I think I know why these mistakes are happening.

[00:03:36] So, part of it is the inexperience or lack of training.

[00:03:44] Because, yeah, you might have went to the course.

[00:03:47] But in emergency management, we kind of have this thing.

[00:03:51] You're only as good as the last disaster you responded to.

[00:03:55] And that's where you hone your skills.

[00:03:58] You can sit in a million classes.

[00:04:00] But until you see the devastation up front and the problems that come with it.

[00:04:07] And you're not solving these problems.

[00:04:12] That's when you get your actual practical experience.

[00:04:15] So, a lot of these fire chiefs and county coordinators probably never experienced anything like this.

[00:04:26] I would say probably, but I'm confident it's probably 100%.

[00:04:31] Unless they've deployed to like Katrina or something like that.

[00:04:37] And participated.

[00:04:38] Because one thing you don't do.

[00:04:41] First of all, you establish command and control early.

[00:04:44] Early on.

[00:04:46] An incident command center.

[00:04:48] You establish that.

[00:04:49] And this is the local folks.

[00:04:51] The local people establish the incident command center.

[00:04:57] As close to the disaster as possible, but someplace safe.

[00:05:02] So you don't have to relocate it.

[00:05:05] And if the federal forces come in afterwards, they come in and augment.

[00:05:11] And we'll talk a ton about the federal response.

[00:05:17] Because too little, too late.

[00:05:20] They're still not where they should be.

[00:05:23] You know, if you deploy a combat engineer battalion, they have chainsaws.

[00:05:30] They have everything to take care of obstacles.

[00:05:34] Infantry?

[00:05:34] Yeah, infantry too.

[00:05:36] Infantry too.

[00:05:37] You need hands and backs and able bodies.

[00:05:41] Okay?

[00:05:42] To clear debris.

[00:05:44] To do functions.

[00:05:46] To run things.

[00:05:48] And they can do that.

[00:05:50] Communications.

[00:05:51] The military comes in with their own communications package.

[00:05:55] They can talk when no one else can talk.

[00:05:58] So if you deploy any kind of a military unit, you know you're going to have strong backs, able bodies, hands that can do things, and they can communicate.

[00:06:09] Communication is probably the biggest problem that I see.

[00:06:13] They have none.

[00:06:15] There were no backup communications.

[00:06:19] Radios were probably, the relay towers were probably shut down.

[00:06:28] The boss is, I got to pause this.

[00:06:33] The boss says, give me the high sign.

[00:06:36] I hope I can pick up right where I left off because there's just so many, so many things that I'm taking you in with me.

[00:06:45] And we're out running errands.

[00:06:46] It's Saturday.

[00:06:47] It's the first Saturday I'm back.

[00:06:49] So we got to, yeah, and I have a little bit of a something.

[00:06:52] I don't know what's going on.

[00:06:54] I don't know if it's a cold or COVID or what.

[00:06:57] Anyway, PBN family, I'm going to pause it right here.

[00:07:03] Okay, so I'm back.

[00:07:04] And who knows your area better than the county, you know, fire chief or sheriff?

[00:07:12] Those people need to be incident commanders.

[00:07:15] And when the federal government comes in, they need to integrate into that operation.

[00:07:22] So much so that, you know, maybe, maybe, you know, we had logistical support areas.

[00:07:31] That's where a staging area for all the, you know, generators and someone kept track of the resources that came in.

[00:07:41] So my experience is these people are maybe school trained and not so much firsthand disaster training.

[00:07:57] So also at the state level, they should have known.

[00:08:02] We had, when I was in emergency management in Pennsylvania, we had a computer program that you could inject as many inches of rainfall in a short period of time as possible and see all the probable outcomes.

[00:08:17] And this was back in 2002, 2004.

[00:08:22] They probably have so much better now.

[00:08:26] And redundancy and backups.

[00:08:29] They don't have redundancy and backups or they'd have satellite communications up and running.

[00:08:35] If, if the cell towers or what they were banking on, then, then they should have had, because satellite is so much cheaper now than it used to be.

[00:08:49] And, and, and they have emergency radio frequencies.

[00:08:54] The 800 megahertz.

[00:08:56] This was, this was a system that was put in place after 9-11 because we, we found a lot of problems with communications.

[00:09:05] And the 800 megahertz system was a way to get everybody on the same type of radio.

[00:09:14] And there wasn't a mix, mix mash of, of communications gear, gear, the same type.

[00:09:21] And it was interchangeable.

[00:09:23] And then all you had to do was change frequencies.

[00:09:26] So, um, that's part of it.

[00:09:31] And then once you have, you have everybody, uh, already established.

[00:09:37] Okay.

[00:09:38] You don't go in and change the game.

[00:09:42] If you have a place where you are dropping off supplies, a warehouse, a hanger, you don't change that.

[00:09:51] You augment it.

[00:09:52] Okay.

[00:09:54] So that's what they're, they're not doing.

[00:09:57] They are trying to change everything and it shouldn't be that way.

[00:10:03] Um, another thing that the magnitude of this disaster is on a scale, uh, like Katrina, whereas the people that are supposed to respond are also part of the victims.

[00:10:23] Yeah.

[00:10:26] Yeah.

[00:10:27] Katrina was so big that the emergency response people, they themselves needed help.

[00:10:34] So you're not going to go to work.

[00:10:36] If your family is in trouble, is in danger, you're not going to go to work.

[00:10:44] Uh, you're going to be taking care of your family.

[00:10:47] So all of those emergency responders that would, would do their, they're probably cut off like everybody else.

[00:10:56] And they're probably having the same problems that everybody else is.

[00:11:01] Uh, and, um, we had a system, uh, called C-Mac.

[00:11:07] Uh, I think it was C-Mac.

[00:11:10] Mutual Aid Assistance Compact.

[00:11:13] Um, and this was, this was way, way back.

[00:11:19] Uh, and it was a computerized system that allowed other states and it was at the state level.

[00:11:28] Okay.

[00:11:29] The state level would put it out to the counties.

[00:11:31] Hey, do you have any ambulance crews that you can spare?

[00:11:34] And then the ambulance crews that they could spare, they would say, yeah, we got this and this is the capabilities.

[00:11:43] Also what this did was standardize a response packet.

[00:11:48] And these people that would go in there would come in self-contained.

[00:11:52] They would bring their own food.

[00:11:54] They would bring their own water, you know, for seven days.

[00:11:58] They would have that with them.

[00:12:00] They wouldn't go into a disaster area expecting support.

[00:12:06] So that, that's what this did.

[00:12:09] Uh, also everybody didn't lean forward.

[00:12:14] I mean, this thing happened on Friday and the federal government didn't declare an emergency until Monday.

[00:12:22] That, that's just crazy.

[00:12:24] Now the governor's work declaring disaster before it hit, which is good because it mobilizes forces.

[00:12:33] Um, but you gotta, you gotta get as many hands on deck as possible beforehand.

[00:12:40] Stage them, have, have staging areas all set up for the guard.

[00:12:46] You know, the, the guard is good at rescue and recovery.

[00:12:51] Okay.

[00:12:52] So the, the vehicles and, and aviation, you know, air traffic control.

[00:13:01] If they're talking about this, oh, you're going into restricted airspace.

[00:13:05] Well, you know what?

[00:13:06] If they activate the, the, the, the aviation brigade, which they have in Pennsylvania, they have their own air traffic control people.

[00:13:17] And they can, they can set up, you know, fly zones and, uh, notums, uh, all, they could set up all of that.

[00:13:27] Uh, it just wasn't, wasn't done.

[00:13:30] And, uh, you know, you could talk about the motivation all you want.

[00:13:34] You could say, well, they're Trump voters, blah, blah, blah.

[00:13:37] It's, it's incompetence.

[00:13:40] It's, it's incompetence.

[00:13:43] It's all levels at all levels.

[00:13:46] Um, and part of it is because the disaster was so big and so massive.

[00:13:54] Now lessons learned for you as preppers.

[00:13:58] Okay.

[00:13:59] I, I try to get this across to Maria, but she keeps saying, well, that'll never happen to us.

[00:14:05] That'll never happen to us.

[00:14:06] Yeah.

[00:14:06] Yeah.

[00:14:07] That's what these people said.

[00:14:09] And, and yeah, it might not where we are.

[00:14:12] We don't have a lot of, we're almost to the crest of the mountain.

[00:14:16] Okay.

[00:14:17] So we're not going to get the mud slide.

[00:14:20] We may be the slider, but we're not going to get the slide itself.

[00:14:27] You know, um, but, uh, here's what you gotta do.

[00:14:33] You gotta take the situation, take out the cause and overlay that onto your plan.

[00:14:44] And I would execute my emergency plan if that happened, because think about it, no electricity

[00:14:52] and they're talking going into winter months.

[00:14:55] They're, they're talking now being able to survive the winter.

[00:15:01] That's huge.

[00:15:02] So you gotta have security, power, heat.

[00:15:09] Uh, everybody's talking about solar generators.

[00:15:13] Well, solar, you gotta understand the limits of solar and yeah, it would have been great.

[00:15:19] They, they don't put out as much electricity as a gas power generator.

[00:15:25] They're very, you know, limited in that respect.

[00:15:28] And the sun has to shine.

[00:15:32] So if you got overcast, which was overcast quite a few days.

[00:15:37] Now they did have sunny days, but you know, uh, if there's a constant drain on this thing,

[00:15:45] it's not going to charge up fast enough.

[00:15:48] It's just the way it is.

[00:15:50] So understand the capabilities and limitations of all the things you have in your preps.

[00:15:56] And, and there again, decrease the amount of electric necessity that you may have.

[00:16:05] Okay.

[00:16:06] If you know, Amish hand tools, hand tools sold out, you know, hand saws, all that kind of

[00:16:16] stuff sold out, axes sold out.

[00:16:20] I have so many axes and I keep getting more.

[00:16:24] And Maria says, what are you getting at?

[00:16:25] We, well, I want to be able to arm other people with axes.

[00:16:31] You know, if we need to chop things down and I got backs, but I don't got axes.

[00:16:37] Well, you know, there's your limitation.

[00:16:39] So I want to have way more axes than I can wield and my son can wield.

[00:16:46] I want to have way more because if you don't have it on hand, you're not going to get it.

[00:16:53] So the scale and magnitude of this disaster was far beyond anything that these people could

[00:17:01] have imagined.

[00:17:04] Okay.

[00:17:05] Okay.

[00:17:06] And the state emergency management people should have been tracking this and planning this

[00:17:13] and pre positioning resources.

[00:17:16] I, when I went down there, I saw, you know, utility trucks heading down that way.

[00:17:24] So they knew ahead of time.

[00:17:26] I mean, the utilities knew.

[00:17:30] Uh, I think it was just a big failure on everybody's part at all level.

[00:17:37] I mean, yeah.

[00:17:42] And communication, you know, communication, the, the, uh, news media did not cover it.

[00:17:50] They're still not covering it.

[00:17:52] Not the way it should be.

[00:17:53] And they, they don't, uh, they don't care.

[00:17:57] Uh, people, people should have been told to stay away from these areas to not try and travel

[00:18:04] through.

[00:18:05] And the information that they, they got should have been, Hey, this, this road is unpassable.

[00:18:12] Don't even attempt it.

[00:18:14] And there's sections of interstate that have been washed away that will take, huh?

[00:18:21] How many months years maybe to even get back in place?

[00:18:25] Because if they have to reroute the interstate, there has to be a whole new survey done.

[00:18:33] Anyway, PBN family, those are just the random thoughts of going around in the NBC guy's head.

[00:18:40] You can take with them what you want, you know, take out of it, uh, what you think you could use.

[00:18:47] Uh, satellite communication is much, much cheaper now than it was back in 2002.

[00:18:55] I remember at the state emergency management agency, we had one sat phone that we tested every week.

[00:19:04] And all we did was take it outside, turn it on, test it because it costs so much money to communicate over satellite that we didn't, we didn't use it that much.

[00:19:15] Um, of course we had a lot of redundancy.

[00:19:20] Ah, PBN family, take care, prep on and keep those people in your prayers.

[00:19:27] There's still, still a lot of people on account for hundreds, hundreds.

[00:19:34] Take care and prep on.