by Laura Garber
Glass cuts from shattered windows. Neighbors trapped under debris. The smell of leaking gas, smoke rising in the distance.
These were the scenarios that about a dozen Hermosa Beach residents practiced responding to on Monday, February 9, during a HbCERT refresher training. The Community Emergency Response Team volunteers are preparing for the moment when professional firefighters and paramedics are hours away, tied up with hundreds of simultaneous calls across the region.
“The communities that have a good tight community, when disaster strikes, respond differently,” said firefighter specialist Christopher Freeman, one of two Los Angeles County Fire Department educators leading the session alongside Captain Brian Kight.
Hermosa Beach launched its first officially credentialed CERT class in 2025, though many residents had already received certification through neighboring cities like Redondo Beach or El Segundo. The free two day course or hybrid online module trains locals as disaster service worker volunteers in fire safety, light search and rescue, team organization and disaster medical operations.
Volunteers have the capacity to be deployed to assist neighboring cities, as demonstrated when some aided in relief efforts during the 2025 Palisades fire.
The program’s origins trace to tragedy. After the 1985 8.1 earthquake in Mexico City killed roughly 10,000 people, untrained volunteers rushed to help in the 15-day rescue operation. One hundred of them died in the effort.
“It was a large number of people who were just trying to help, they were neighbors,” Kight said. The Los Angeles Fire Department created CERT soon after to channel that neighborly instinct into effective, safer response.
The logic is simple: local residents know things professional responders don’t. They know which neighbors have disabilities or medical needs. They know building layouts. They know who might be home during the day.
“One of the biggest components of CERT is identifying the resources,” said Rick Koenig, a contractor who completed the certification. “It’s nice to know there’s a doctor living nearby or where to shut off your neighbor’s gas.”
For Koenig, the training went beyond basic preparedness. “Instead of handling a toaster fire, I wanted to help at major disasters like the fires at Chevron in El Segundo,” he said.
Tommy Gault got certified last year, motivated by the Palisades fire. “I really wanted to be able to help my community if something else happened and to prepare my family,” she said. “We’re due for a giant earthquake soon.”
Her aunt, Janice Brittain, a public works commissioner, has been involved in emergency preparedness since joining the city’s emergency preparedness commission in 2011, before it disbanded around 2016. She attended the refresher training with Gault.
When people understand disaster response, they can organize and help themselves rather than adding to the chaos, Koenig said. He offered an analogy: “There’s a fire extinguisher. CERT is a stress extinguisher.”
Emergency management coordinator Maurice Wright, who’s working to enhance the city’s disaster readiness, emphasized that emergencies require setting aside everyday differences.
“That’s why I get along with every council member and everybody in the community,” Wright said. “I might need you and you might need me.”
The next CERT hybrid certification course with LA County Fire and Hermosa Beach is scheduled for June 27, from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. 2026. The training is free. Those interested in more information can email oem@hermosabeach.gov ER
