Today a major challenge facing EMS and emergency response readiness is the ability to provide staff for enough ambulances in a situation like the Pandemic Flu or to provide sufficient staff in a major community storm that can meet the extreme call volumes with people that possess a basic understanding of how to participate in an EMS response.  These are the words from Jerry Key with American Medical Response. 

"It would not only benefit us for the Festival and other events, but would also be a huge benefit for the Westside since we are on the other side of Pigeon Creek from most of the Emergency services" Dan Fulton President of the west Side Nut Club said.

Over the years the West Side Nut Club has helped the Evansville community in many ways.  Five years ago the West Side Nut Club purchased a M.U.L.E for AMR to use at highly attended community events such as the West Side Nut Club's Fall Festival and the Freedom Festival held at the Evansville Riverfront every June.

"That vehicle has been very valuable and a key tool in providing EMS during our large community events since then. The Nut Club has a reputation of being a group of people committed to promoting this community and helping others and AMR would like to build on this asset."  added Kay.

This newest partnership with EMA will train members of the Nut Club in eight areas of Community Emergency Response Training.  These include disaster preparedness, disaster fire suppression, disaster medical operations part 1, disaster medical operations part 2, light search & rescue operations, disaster psychology & team organizations, terrorism, and a final exercise. AMR will train members in CPR.

The EMA would like to recruit the West Side Nut Club to participate in such a community event on two levels.
The first would entail being prepared to assist in your own home and neighborhood when a major event occurs. The second would be as part of a formalized response to assist in providing manpower to EMA and  to assist AMR with our EMS response. The backbone of this is the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training program. It is designed to be a 20 hour training program focused on preparing people to assist each other in a large scale event.

As an organizer of one of the largest events in the tri-state area, the West Side Nut Club feels that not only will this help make the Fall Festival a safer event for its patrons, but a way for the club to be a leader in Community Emergency Response Training that more clubs and citizens will want to participate in.

For more information on CERT training or how to prepare yourself for a disaster contact the Evansville EMA. Click on their logo go to to their website.  You can also find additional information and tips by going to the Southwest Indiana Resistant Community Corporation's website.

Below are images of the M.U.L.E purchased by the West Side Nut Club.  Click here for the M.U.L.E purchase story.