Members of Pierce County's Washingon Task Force 1 (WA-TF1) are deploying again to Hawaii, this time to help out ahead of Hurricane Olivia.
WA-TF1 is a specially trained and equipped Urban Search and Rescue Task Force made up of 26 participating agencies, but mainly from Seattle Fire, King County and Pierce County.
Some 35 members Washingon Task Force 1 (WA-TF1) are flying out of Sea-Tac International Airport Saturday afternoon.
The group first deployed to Hawaii to deal with Hurricane Lane in August. They also helped with Hurricane Harvey, which hit the Houston area in 2017.
Pierce County and Washington State Emergency Management had signed an agreement to enable Washington State Task Force 1 (WA-TF1), one of 28 national Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) urban search and rescue teams, to also respond to state and local emergencies in Washington.
Leaders say because they are a federal resource, it had been harder to mobilize this team to respond to a disaster at home. During OSO, Pierce County had to make a special agreement with Snohomish county just to jump in and help.
"It didn't delay the response for Oso it just created an extra layer of bureaucracy,” said Scott Heinze, Deputy Director of Pierce County Emergency Management. "It’s nice to know that if the call comes next week we have this agreement in place we won’t have to go through the process and we'll hit the ground to save people."
