At a closing ceremony Monday, disaster response personnel from Caricom nations were recognized for their participation in the Virgin Islands National Guard’s disaster relief training.

The ceremony concluded the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency’s weeklong workshop that included 11 of the 18 member island nations at VING’s new Regional Training Institute last week in Estate Bethlehem.

Approximately 50 participants – including police, fire and first response personnel – spent the week planning initial response strategies to potential disasters and then carried out the plans in a two-day simulated exercise. According to Maj. Todd VanOrsdel, the exercises included plans responding to the media after a disaster, protesters and stolen supplies. The participants actually packed bags and moved through Customs’ security to reach the simulated disaster in St. Vincent.

The classes included instructors from VING, CDEMA and the U.S. Southern Command. According to Col. Phillip Abbott, the SOUTHCOM provided “strategic resources under very difficult fiscal constraints,” as well as several trainers.

Lt. Col Kenneth Alleyne said VING shared its preparedness training and logistical planning expertise. They introduced resources from the V.I. Territory Emergency Management Agency such as tsunami maps, and V.I. Alert, he said.

Currently the CDEMA countries are able to communicate only with certain officials but they said they hope to incorporate a system such as V.I. Alert throughout their member countries so that information on earthquakes, tsunamis and hurricanes can be available instantly to residents.

“This is important because if something happens in the Caribbean region, these are family members, family neighbors. What impacts them, impacts us as well,” Alleyne said.

In the closing ceremony, Abbot said teamwork was essential to the profession and during a disaster it is “very important to identify, evaluate, validate these processes, these roles and responsibilities.”

Representatives from CDEMA thanked VING for the hospitality and use of the training facility. Joanne Persad, CDEMA director, said the organization founded in 1991 assisted disaster victims in St. Vincent, St. Lucia and Dominica in 2013. She said they hope to form a partnership with the U.S. Virgin Islands in the near future.

“We’re part of the Caribbean team. We do have a lot of work ahead of us. This is just the start,” she said.

Maj. Andrew Darlington, director of the CARICOM Disaster Relief Unit, spoke on behalf of CDRU, the operational arm of CDEMA.

Members of CDEMA include the Bahamas, Belize, Haiti, Turks and Caicos, Anguilla, Montserrat, St. Kitts and Nevis, the British Virgin Islands, Grenada, Guyana, Suriname, Dominica, St. Lucia, Jamaica, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, St. Vincent and the Grenadines. There are 35 individual members representing 18 island nations and about 40 employees. The headquarters is in Barbados.