The Past, Present, and Future of South Carolina Task Force 1: Part 3

December 18, 2024

Finding funding and the deployment to Louisiana in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

The Past, Present, and Future of South Carolina Task Force 1: Part 3
Finding funding and the deployment to Louisiana in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

One of the most significant challenges for any volunteer-based service is funding, and Task Force 1 was no exception. The dollars add up quickly when state-of-the-art equipment is necessary to safely perform the services provided during a deployment. The counterterrorism grants got the program started, but dollars can only be stretched so far.

“Every year was a battle for funding,” Don Headrick remembers. “Our cache of equipment, you know, you’re looking at $10 or $12 million worth of equipment… We train with it, so it’s not like it sits in a box and is never used. That’s part of our training, we pull our equipment out and we utilize it.”

Mick Mayers recalls the question on everyone’s mind, asking, “The biggest issue that held it back then was how do you fund it? How do you fund something that is going to require millions just in equipment purchases in the beginning?”

“There were a lot of people who wanted to take our lunch,” Mayers tells. “One of the things that we were standing on was that this was going to be an all-state asset.”

Instrumental in the creation of the documentation, procedures, and guidelines for SC-TF1, Mayers remembers the moments that the dream of a statewide response felt within reach, stating, “Everybody says that we’re this and we’re that, but I’m like, until I can say we’re Task Force 1 and we’re buying these paper clips, I’m going to be the skeptic I am. Later on, when we were able to buy things, I’d raise the bar a little bit and it ended up becoming, ‘I’m not gonna believe this until I’ve got 70 guys standing in front of me and we’re getting ready to go out the door on a deployment.’”

SC-TF1 got its first deployment orders in the fall of 2005. The team packed up and caravaned to Louisiana in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. This first deployment to Louisiana is significant and memorable and marks the beginning of a decades-long relationship between Louisiana and South Carolina.

“On that night in August when we were getting ready to go to Katrina and we were all kinda standing around, I thought, ‘I guess we’re it now,’” Mayers recalls.

“We still get people from Louisiana who knew we were there or worked with us… that see us and realize what we did and what we provided,” Headrick continues, “When we went to St. Bernard’s Parish, we were the first official US&R team on the ground there and that was 8-10 days after the hurricane strike. Those people were really devastated and had not yet seen any outside resources in their particular area.”

“We coordinated with Mobilization and we were able to take some specially trained teams that we knew of and we knew what their capabilities were… and basically bring them in and operate as one team, but really it was several entities coming together as one team from South Carolina to meet the requested needs of Louisiana to give them what they were asking for but still leave a response resource here in state,” Tom Webb says, recalling the deployment.

Not only did the team fulfill its requested duties, but they also manned a local agency’s fire trucks to relieve the firefighters who had not been home in almost two weeks. Webb states, “There were so many little things that happened there that brought out the best in people.”

Big things happened, too. The three men – Don Headrick, Mick Mayers, and Tom Webb – all recall one particular moment from their time in Louisiana in 2005.

“I was out in the field, but I wasn’t knocking on doors,” Headrick begins. “Our team went into a church, and there was a lady there who had been there for 10 days, and she was still alive. The team rescued her, got her to medical, and she survived. You don’t typically in that type of environment see a live person you’re rescuing… That was a win for us.”

Mick Mayers tells the same story, stating, “There was a woman who had been left for dead in a church. They had gone in and found the woman was still alive and extracted her. That was a big event.”

“Our first live rescue was done at Katrina,” Webb states as he recalls the same moment remembered by Headrick and Mayers. “It was a lady who was found in the attic of a church… In the confusion of something that great, word never got back that she was there. The team doing a systematic door-by-door, every structure, search, found her. She was suffering from exposure, dehydration, and malnutrition, but she was alive.”

The deployment to Louisiana in response to Hurricane Katrina was the Task Force’s first big test, and they passed with flying colors.

“The commitment of the people, the team members, just, that kinda spells it out,” Webb says. “For somebody to be willing to work that hard… just awesome individuals, truly committed to the state but truly committed to serving humanity. What a pleasure for me to be able to work with them. True pleasure.”

Character is revealed in the face of adversity. Mayers remembers a moment during the deployment that stuck with him, stating, “It’s hard to be happy in a major disaster like that… but it was one of those things where I was standing in front of these guys and we had done so much together, and endured so much together, trained for it, and I remember doing the ORE when we were out there 48 hours in the pouring rain, and nobody quit. Nobody was complaining. They were breaking rocks in the rain and kept right at it.”

When the Task Force was in St. Tammany Parrish, some of the teams had adopted a 3 p.m. curfew for safety reasons. Two South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) agents had deployed with the Task Force and were sworn by the local sheriff, and the two traveled with Task Force 1. The leadership team took the idea of a 3 p.m. curfew back to the members.

“We discussed it and mentioned it to our team members. They were like, ‘No, it doesn’t get dark till 7:30, 8 o’clock. Let us work till 6, we’ll be back,’” Webb says. “Just them begging, ‘Let us work.’ You don’t find that too often anymore. ‘Let us work.’”

The relationships formed during Hurricane Katrina are still important to both South Carolina and Louisiana. For two states regularly targeted by hurricanes, having working relationships is critical in the face of disaster. Trusting the people being sent out the door is paramount.

“There’s a level of comfort that when a team shows up that I know the people. Instead of going to give a business card and a handshake for the first time, I can give a hug and ask how they’re doing,” South Carolina Emergency Response Task Force Chief Chad Beam states on the importance of relationships. “When they’re out in our state, I’m not worried about what they’re doing… we know we’re sending friends out to do the same work that our folks are already out doing. Then we can reciprocate that to them.”

“You realize when you have a large-scale event, you can’t handle it by yourself,” Headrick states. “You have to have those resources.”

Pelham Batesville Fire Department Chief Phill Jolley was a key player in the creation of Task Force 1 and echoes the significance of relationships. “The relationships that we’ve developed with other states and other communities pays us back, and we’ve seen that this year,” he recalled.

The 2024 hurricane season would indeed put the importance of a statewide response team at the forefront of everyone’s minds.