The September 11 terrorist attack on the World Trade center has offered valuable lessons to first-time respondents regarding the essence of adopting safety precautions prior to visiting such a site. The aftermath of the attacks could still be felt many years afterward, and not only due to the people who lost their lives but also as a result of the rescuers who ended up being exposed to harmful gases that ended up posing a great risk to their lives. Some of the respondents also lost their lives in the process and this serves as a lesson to many who plan on playing the heroic card once such a tragedy has occurred. There are a number of personnel safety issues that occurred as will be illustrated in the section below.
It is apparent that the terrorism response teams often encounter great danger in their quest to rescue victims after an event of terror has occurred. The unfair and unpredictable scenes faced by these individuals are often troubling ( Maniscalco & Christen, 2003 ). One of the greatest challenges experienced by these individuals was the lack of personal protective equipment. These people appear to have responded promptly and thus many of them happened to have forgotten their safety gear, and they could not go back to get them since they were confronted with a great necessity of rescuing individuals from the site ( Andhyarujina & Commonwealth Law Conference, 2003 ). In this case, there was an imminent threat of debris that was falling from buildings. At first, this did not appear to startle them since they were yet to discover that the debris falling from the building was toxic and hence likely to impact negatively on their health.
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Secondly, many of them, later on, got to learn that there is a great price for people to pay for acts of heroism since the aftermath of the events that occurred that day led many of them; as much as 40000 individuals to acquire chronic ailments which are still affecting them up until now (Torres, 2006). This resulted from the asbestos particles and harmful effluents that filled the surrounding regions where this tragic event occurred (Torres, 2006). As a result, many of the first respondents are currently suffering from chronic ailments such as Cancer. One such victim is John Feal, who was contracted to work at the site (Torres, 2006). The latter individual indicates that he was never warned by anyone to wear a mask during that entire time, hence the reason for his current tribulations. Like most workers, he is unable to go back to work and hence likely to experience more problems in regard to supporting his family.
To sum it all up, there is no doubt that the attacks that were experienced caused dreadful consequences for the first time respondents who appeared to rescue individuals. Majority of them were exposed to destructive gases which ended up causing dreadful impacts on their health. In addition to this, the events ended up affecting not only the victims who succumbed at the time the act of terror occurred but also those who rushed to rescue them. In order to deal with such an event, the Federal government should be tasked with the responsibility of handling such issues and also ensuring that they provide all the necessary protective gear required by respondents to such tragedies in order to avoid having more victims resulting from such events. Besides, proper educational incentives ought to be adopted to educate individuals on the various safety incentives that they can take to protect themselves from such happenings. Finally, it is now imperative that people ought to take safety precautions in the event that such a tragedy occurs in the future.
References
Maniscalco, P. M., & Christen, H. T. (2003). Terrorism response: Field guide for fire and EMS organizations . Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall.
Andhyarujina, T. R., & Commonwealth Law Conference. (January 01, 2003). Terrorism: Meeting the challenges / finding the balance.
Torres, K. (2006). 9/11: Safety and Health Lessons Learned . Retrieved from http://www.ehstoday.com/fire_emergencyresponse/ehs_imp_38472
