Mutual Aid Request - Caddington Bedfordshire -

[StephenCuthbert]

Hi,



Incident: -

We have been supporting the Caddington Gas, Water & Electric outage at the Village of Caddington, Bedfordshire since Sunday morning where we delivered to 181 homes fan heaters and electric cookers, as well as adhoc checks on vulnerable people when we lost phase 1 of the electric supply.



We are on site today (Mon 21 Dec) to assist with confirming vulnerable peoples are ok; working with multiple agencies MSAR, St Johns and Red Cross.



Command & Control: -

I have a loose Command & Control in place my self as Gold Commander off site; Sliver command as our controller off site with Beds Coordinator on and off site and Bronze command working on the ground whoever we volunteer and is capable.



Support Role: -

I’m waiting confirmation of our continued support into Tuesday/Wednesday. I have people on site up until this evening where I will stand them down after 20:00 subject to confirmation from Bedfordshire & Luton Local Resilience Forum (BLLRF) Control



I’m looking for support during the day to assist with BLLRF control. Today we have supported districted nurses to vulnerable peoples homes, worked with MSAR to deliver updates door to door. Additional deliveries of fan heaters and cookers.



We have been requested three 4X4 Response people for tomorrow from 08:00 to 20:00 we maybe able to support a shift change later in the day from 16:00 but I’ve utilised all my resources during Sunday and today. Herts 4X4 Team are maxed out with their own work plus we are already utilising two of their team in the last 48 hours.



Contact: -

In the first instance please call me 07795 981402 and advise if you are able to assist, our MOU with BLLRF is mileage. This will be an initial contact for standby until we invoke later this evening. I will advise rest centre and incident control location. National Grid Gas (NGG) runs incident control centre. Any assistance or advice gratefully received.



All volunteers work through BLLRF control. Thank you



Regards

Stephen Cuthbert

BHC 4x4 Response – Coordinator (Gold)

[mattgreen]

I've forwarded by email to all@peak4x4response.org for you

[StephenCuthbert]

Thank you for your support.



Bob Wessex called me and suggested that I contact BORG who have duly given me three vehicles tomorrow with a possible two additional and we can stand down as we see fit. Also BORG have a couple of volunteers who could support this evening.



Thank you for the direction Bob.



Thank you to BORG who have also just been called to respond to Buck CC and Fire & Rescue in Oxfordshire…

[mark avo]

Just back from the day shift at Caddington.

Spent the day checking on the 'vunerable' who were without electric or gas or water & in some cases all 3!



I think this evening will be even busier as they had another power cut just after I left.



If anyone does attend your heart will be warmed by the thanks of the people you vistit. Their gratitude was amazing, even if they didnt need anything they were so pleased that we were there checking on them.

[JASON PEGG]

steve , back in bedfordshire tonight , if you need ne drop me a line

jason

[Chris C]

I'll ask the team

[PeteRestall]

Thanks to Borg for stepping in to help, we've run our guys ragged this weekend and may still have a couple more days of it.



Avo's been a star, even ended up letting the other half loose with the cheque book on Sunday (Mind you he did let us know about it!!) :lol:



And Jas, tomorrow evening would be handy if you can manage it (Just as long as Tony doesn't need you :oops: )

[PeteRestall]

Just got home after the evening shift at Caddington.



Thanks to BORG, you guys did a great job today, and thanks for supplying a few more vehicles to help our guys tomorrow.



I was talking to one of the Beds Council Emergency Planning Officers before I left tonight and hopefully tomorrow afternoon we should be standing down some personel, as the demand is reducing as the gas supply is restored. It seems that the plan is to keep the centres open and running at tickover over the Christmas period, and we have had an offer from York & Lincs 4X4 Response to help cover that period so thanks for that.



I think this goes to show the strength of the National Network, BHC 4x4 Response is fairly new to this and only has a small membership at present, but we've managed to cope with what can only be described as a major incident, lasting 4 days so far, with the help and advice from other groups. To put it bluntly, with out the National Network we'd have been stuffed.



And as a P.S. We were stuffed by the French (I'll explain later)

[Tony Ferrari]

And as a P.S. We were stuffed by the French (I'll explain later)





:lol: Energie de France by any chance?

[PeteRestall]

And as a P.S. We were stuffed by the French (I'll explain later)





:lol: Energie de France by any chance?



Got it one, I'll explain off line!!!

[BobWessex]

Just a brief note to say well done to all the guys who have been working in Caddington.



This has obviously been a steep learning curve for everyone in BHC, but the upside is that the majority of user bodies in Beds will no doubt be aware of them and be looking to get agreements in place or at least ensure that they have contact numbers.



I would also like to thank those teams who have kindy sent members, during what for many of us has been a busy period. This has demonstrated that we are now in a position to offer an effective national sevice with cross-border mutual aid.

[StephenCuthbert]

Apologies for not posting further updates here from myslef to keep all informed as its been a little busy since Sunday.



Were advised that the village has now been reconnected with Gas and the electricity supply has been stable for the last 18 hours; although at the point of writing this Pete just called me to tell me that one of the generators on site has cut out and were checking the vulnerable peoples now.



We have a lite touch with resources tomorrow with various shifts covering the day to accommodate peoples Christmas Eve needs.



I have a call with the BCC emergency situation room at around 10:00 to confirm either our stand down or we need to cover 25th & 26th Dec. However at this point in time it’s looking like a stand down mid afternoon tomorrow. Perhaps I shouldn't have said that......



I would reiterate Bob's comments in that our National voice should now be heard. Our Press & PR leader on the team has a great idea with regard to advising during traffic alerts on the national radio that when a incident is mentioned they also advise if a 4X4 Response team is in attendance… just a thought right now and will need some working out so when we’ve done that we’ll come back and advise.



Thank you for the call today Bob, it was a welcome boost for me.



Thanks



Regards

Stephen

[PeteRestall]

I'm back from Caddington again.



Looks like things are finally slowing down, this evenings shift only had the one outing to check on the elderly and vulnerable in the area of the latest power outage, spent most of the evening reading the paper and having dinner (must praise the WRVS who have been supplying constant food and drink to the volunteers since Sunday morning).



As I said before, I know we would have really struggled without the National Network, and again a really big thanks to York & Lincs and Wessex for there offers of support over Xmas, BORG for the last 2 days help, and Tony for obvious reasons.



We have had such good feedback from Caddington residents, Beds Council, the National Grid, The District Nurses :P and other volunteer organisations that hopefully other groups can use this incident as an example of how being part of the whole 4x4 Response Network can virtually guarantee coverage of any major incident.



I know this is starting to sound like an Oscar speech, but I am so impressed with the support and advice from other groups, but the ones that haven't been mentioned here much are our own members who have supported not just this incident but a few others as well over the last week.

[robin-baldwin]

Well done lads. Excellent job

[mark avo]

Back from toadys shift...



Good news: We have been offically 'stood down'.



We did a quick run around all the outstanding vunerables this morning & most were either sorted or away with family for the duration.

As there are only a handful that now need watching the council team decided that they could manage fine without us from now on.



As we were saying our goodbyes we were told that the local youth club will be having a fund raiser for all the voulntary agencies that helped out & the Parish Council will be holding a big street party for all the helpers in the summer.



We had a very polite 'hope to not have to see you again' from the council.



The best thing was the reaction from everyone in the village that we visited. Some were cold, some ill, some without gas or electricity for 4 days but they they all seemed so happy that someone was taking the time to check on them. I'm a bit of an anti xmas type but it made me realize what we should be doing at xmas.



I'm sure all the groups that assisted or offered assistance will be aware by now that it's all over bar the shouting & can I take this chance to pass on both my & the village's thanks for everyones efforts.



We also managed to blag a few new members while we were about, Pete picked one up on his rounds this morning & the chairman of the Parish council is also joining up!