Calif. Search & Rescue Team Heads To Japan
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- An elite Los Angeles County Fire Department Urban Search and Rescue team is on its way to Japan.
A department dispatcher says the 72 team members, six dogs and 74,000 pounds of equipment and supplies left early Saturday for the quake-devastated area.
Capt. Ed Lozano says the task force includes firefighters, emergency room doctors, engineers and hazardous materials technicians. There are also members specially trained in underwater rescue.
Lozano says some of the rescue workers just returned from New Zealand, where they were sent after last month's Christchurch quake. They too are on the flight to Japan.
The team was requested by the U.S. Agency for International Development. It's expected to be ready to work by Sunday.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
