History
The origins of the FEMA Task Forces goes back to the early 1980s when the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department and Metro-Dade County Fire Department created search and rescue teams to deal with rescue operations in collapsed buildings. The State Department and the Office of Foreign Disaster Aid requested the help of these teams to assist with rescue operations in the 1985 Mexico City, the 1990 Luzon and the 1989 Leninakan earthquakes.
Seeing the value in having a network of such teams in the United States, FEMA created the National Urban Search and Rescue (US&R) Response System in 1989. In 1991, the concept was incorporated into the National Response Plan. FEMA sponsored 25 national urban search-and-rescue task forces. The number of teams has expanded to 28 since 1991.
Read more about this topic: FEMA Urban Search And Rescue Task Force
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