Canada's military feeling the strain responding to climate change

[Jarnhamar]

Wouldn't that be a sight to see, 

PAFOs will see that picture and it'll be on the next wave of recruiting posters.

 

[Eye In The Sky]

Let's face it, flood and fire fighting isn't rocket science; it's bull work which our military training and organization has and can easily adapt to.

That was true when we were facing nuclear disaster oriented aid to the civil power and is even more relevant today.

Canada gives DND around $25 billion per year. If we're really stressing out some units or elements for these type of operations then it's our own bloody fault. The CDS needs to get his own house in order before he start whining to the public like Oliver Twist: "Please, Sir. Can I have some more?".

:worms:

Maybe it is the supporting kit/equipment that makes up some of "want/need" list?  Res units, years ago, didn't get *1 for 1* exchanges on things like the G-Wagons when the Iltis was scrapped;  TCCCS radios also were not a 1-for-1 for 77, 46/49 sets.  I don't know if the CommRes lost #s in their CPs over the last decade +.  How is say, the Army Reserve with troop transport capabilities...is there a healthy ratio of # of troops and available troop transport?  Res units used to sometimes suffer from higher VOR #s back in my Res days.

Air assets are also helpful to move troops/equipment quickly.  We're supporting Mali, Latvia, NEON, IMPACT, etc etc simultaneously;  this puts quite a bit of weight on the Transport Sqns keeping things moving.  We've got TacHel assets deployed to Iraq and Mali...

The average Reg or Res servicemember isn't trained for fire-fighting;  if we deploy, we (I'm assuming) need SMEs to help 'effectively lead our efforts".  If we provided some key people in each level with training, would that not help us be more autonomous during DomOps in basic things like fire-fighting (I have no idea how/where to attack a forest fire)?

I've no experience with how the CAF and provincial EMOs interface in situations like this, other than assuming LOs are used at the higher level of interaction.

 

[mariomike]

PAFOs will see that picture and it'll be on the next wave of recruiting posters.

20 years ago. Seems like yesterday.

 

[tomahawk6]

Cant beat Mother Nature much less control it.  ;D

 

[Brad Sallows]

People have been beating mother nature for millennia, but not 100% of the time.  As with any contest, you have to know the enemy and know yourself.  It's just as hard to pin down what "climate change" means to people on the "convinced" side as on the "skeptical" side.  If everything weather-related can be blamed on "climate change" and outlier events are always immediately assumed to represent long-term trends, there will be many more things to fix and improve than there are resources to fix and improve them.

 

[tomahawk6]

Fighting Nature wont require tanks or artillery or bullets or even ships.

 

[Jarnhamar]

Canada's military feeling the strain responding to climate change

Church of Climate change.

 

[brihard]

Church of Climate change.

Well the climate is changing, in big and small ways, and we are seeing the effects of it and the military is having to deploy more. Senior CAF leadership saying that doesn’t mean they’re staking out a position on what’s causing it. Just that it’s here and causing more DOMOPS than we’re historically used to.

 

[Jarnhamar]

Well the climate is changing, in big and small ways, and we are seeing the effects of it and the military is having to deploy more. Senior CAF leadership saying that doesn’t mean they’re staking out a position on what’s causing it. Just that it’s here and causing more DOMOPS than we’re historically used to.

Not disagreeing the climate is changing but I think there's some discrepancy between how much is natural and how much is a result of human behavior. There's obviously a following out there who are ready to label everything climate change.

Hot/cold summer, above/below average snow.  Wet/dry summer. It reminded me of debating with a friend. God sent the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs--kind of impossible to disprove that

The CAF is deploying more to fight floods and fires. Is that because there's more of them happening or just because we weren't ordered to deploy to the other ones?

When you look at the 2015 numbers, the sheer size of the area burned is stunning. The total forest burned in 2015 (as of Aug. 17) is 3,004,848 hectares. That’s a larger area than the island of Sicily, Italy.

And in 2014, which was the worst fire season since 2007, 4,123,986 hectares burned, the equivalent of burning the entire country of Switzerland.

I think it could be argued the amount we deploy can also be policy driven and not just an indicator of climate change increasing disasters.

 

[mariomike]

For reference to the discussion,

Global Warming/Climate Change Super Thread 
https://navy.ca/forums/threads/32987.1050
118 pages.

 

[Remius]

Not disagreeing the climate is changing but I think there's some discrepancy between how much is natural and how much is a result of human behavior. There's obviously a following out there who are ready to label everything climate change.

Hot/cold summer, above/below average snow.  Wet/dry summer. It reminded me of debating with a friend. God sent the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs--kind of impossible to disprove that

The CAF is deploying more to fight floods and fires. Is that because there's more of them happening or just because we weren't ordered to deploy to the other ones?


I think it could be argued the amount we deploy can also be policy driven and not just an indicator of climate change increasing disasters.

and the CDS made no mention of it being man made or what not.  Just that we are responding to more climate related incidents.  We've had two 100 year floods in two years here in the valley.  Might be a fluke or might be a trend.  There are more happening, it just so happens that local authorities are asking for help more often.  In 2017 the NCR and area waited too long and did not ask for help.  they were not taking that chance again this time and asked early. 

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Some will argue that the increase of forest fires is as much to do with the pine beetle and 100 years of fire suppression catching up to us.

 

[Jarnhamar]

and the CDS made no mention of it being man made or what not.  Just that we are responding to more climate related incidents. 

Yer right pardner he didn't.
I was quoting the title of the cbc piece. The CDS clearly said "climate-related events".

We've had two 100 year floods in two years here in the valley.  Might be a fluke or might be a trend.

Exactly.

There are more happening, it just so happens that local authorities are asking for help more often.

Im not trying to sound like a climate change denier, because I'm not, but the bc wild fires aren't a new thing. I haven't looked at the frequency of them by year and compared them yet.

I'm probably seeing things between the lines that aren't there but the story, to me, implied these events are happening at an alarming new rate so much so the CAF can't respond.

 

[rmc_wannabe]

Just throwing it out there, but I would love to see what the Emergency Preparedness Plans look like for these provinces first. How many of their surplus budgets have back stopped by cutting funding from conservation and disaster response? I can't help but feel that calling the CAF in has become the default COA when things get wet or catch fire.

 

[OldTanker]

I can't speak to other provinces, but neither BC nor Alberta put anything like the necessary resources into emergency preparedness and response that they should. This is even worse at the municipal level. I suggest there is no, repeat no, municipality in Alberta or BC that puts the necessary resources into being prepared for a disaster, natural or man-made. Maybe, just maybe, Calgary might come close, but even they underfund their emergency program. It gets progressively worse the closer you get to the coast. So, once bad stuff happens, there is little recourse but to request federal support, and since other than DND, the federal government has pretty much NO capability to respond to a disaster (we have no equivalent of FEMA in the US), the CF is the default go-to. And its going to get worse, so either the CF is going to have to be prepared to respond on a more regular basis, or be prepared to say no. Let's see how that plays out.

 

[Remius]

Just throwing it out there, but I would love to see what the Emergency Preparedness Plans look like for these provinces first. How many of their surplus budgets have back stopped by cutting funding from conservation and disaster response? I can't help but feel that calling the CAF in has become the default COA when things get wet or catch fire.

Possibly.  but as I mentioned, when we had a flood in 2017 the city here did everything it could not to call the CAF so much so they were in denial.  People basically fended for themselves.

This time they called in the CAF for help partly I think because of the backlash of the last one.

 

[QV]

The climate has been changing since the beginning of time, and it will continue to do so.  In recent decades there have been longer intervals between F5 tornados in the US, than in the past.  Is this change good?  There were a lot of temperature records set in 2010.  There are also a lot of temperature records that remain since the early 20th century.  So if some places have not had an extreme temperature swing in 80 or 90 years, is that good or bad?  Nothing new here.           

We need to be good stewards of the environment, but there has been a lot of dishonesty about climate change and it's being used to advance political agendas.   

 

[mariomike]

I suggest there is no, repeat no, municipality in Alberta or BC that puts the necessary resources into being prepared for a disaster, natural or man-made.

The City of Vancouver has Canada Task Force 1. HUSAR.
https://twitter.com/cantf1?lang=en

https://vancouver.ca/home-property-development/urban-search-and-rescue.aspx

The City of Calgary has Canada Task Force 2. HUSAR.
https://twitter.com/cantf2?lang=en

http://www.cantf2.com/

The City of Toronto also has a HUSAR unit. Canada Task Force 3. ( CAN - TF3 ).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_(CAN-TF3)_Heavy_Urban_Search_and_Rescue

https://www.toronto.ca/311/knowledgebase/kb/docs/articles/fire-services/training-and-technical-operations/toronto-husar.html
"Toronto HUSAR is an acronym for Heavy Urban Search And Rescue Team, which is a multi-service, multi-skilled, and multi-functional task force developed within the framework of existing response agencies such as the Toronto Police Service/Toronto Paramedic Services/Toronto Fire Service."

 

[Eye In The Sky]

The climate has been changing since the beginning of time, and it will continue to do so. 

….there has been a lot of dishonesty about climate change and it's being used to advance political agendas. 

This I agree with 100%.

 

[OldTanker]

For Mario Mike. (I don't know how to post a quote from a previous post). The HUSAR teams are a good start and the three municipalities (and the provinces and feds who have provided support and funding) are to be congratulated. But these three teams, for the entire country, do not represent any sort of level of adequate preparation. I stand by my statement. We, collectively, are woefully prepared for a major disaster and the only significant mobile, deployable and self-contained response agency is the CF.