Joe Hernandez was a medical urban search and rescue expert/responder to the Twin Towers. He shares his experience with us on this anniversary episode.
We welcome USAR expert Joe Hernandez back to the Disaster Tough Podcast for a special episode in honor of the 20th anniversary of 9/11. In the wake of the attacks, Joe and his USAR team were deployed to Ground Zero. Episode airs on all major podcast platforms.
This Podcast has moved to the Readiness Lab.
Host: John Scardena (0s):
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Host: John Scardena (1m 41s):
Welcome back to the show, everybody, it's your host, John Scardena. I am overly optimistic in this episode, despite the topic, you know, we've learned a lot of lessons since 9/11. We've talked about it before with Joey, we promised that Joe is going to come back on the show. As you may recall, if you've listened to the other episode, Joe Hernandez is a medical urban search and rescue expert. He was at ground zero in the twin towers. He actually has his own podcast called solid responder. It just launched what he's going to be doing on that show is be sharing stories and lessons, tips from first responders, including in his first episode, he talks with another expert who responded to the Pentagon. So we can talk a little bit more about that, but today we really want to focus on the stories, the heroes, what we need to do as a country, what we need to do to get it back on track. We have gotten on track, off track. You can see behind me, I switched out our logo today from disaster tough to the American flag because right after 9/11, it was all about America, about coming together about United. I really think that we need to do that again now. So with that introduction, Joe, thank you so much for coming back on the show.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (2m 53s):
Hey John, it's always a pleasure to be on your show and more, it's always a pleasure to see you, my friend, how are you?
Host: John Scardena (2m 60s):
I’m doing good. You know, I really appreciate that. You know, I should be asking how you're doing because I was pretty young when it happened. I remember it happening, I was still in school, but the fact that you responded, the fact that, you know, you had to deal with that. I think we were talking before, what was it? Six, 600 per million particles. We're talking, you know, the breathing, there's been a lot of impacts to first responders. It is incredible that you're operating at the level that you're operating, you know, an extreme level. It's really sad that a lot of our first responders, brothers and sisters have been impacted. So 20 years later, I guess my first real question is how are you doing? How's the community doing? Is are we doing anything different? Have we improved? What are your general thoughts about 9/11?
Guest: Joe Hernandez (3m 53s):
Boy, those thoughts circle around my head 360 degrees. I'm doing fine. I'm going towards my 42nd year of marriage strong. Having that other, that partner in your life really helps with that response community that you belong to able to share those stories, those fears, those ideas, and then at the same time, trying to be a good listener because they go through an incredible amount of emotion while you're gone from fear to terror, to uncertainties to, hey, I need the power of attorney because the refrigerator broke, the ice maker is not working. The TV's not, you know, and everything that goes on. To that end, thank you for asking and we're doing really good, thankful to that. It's interesting to hear that you were young, even though you're married with two children yourself and I did get to see my three children prior to leaving for the world trade center on that Tuesday morning, stop in at the high school and visiting with my two sons and my daughter and saying goodbye to them, the school resource officer saluting and paying his respects as we left, heading to homesteaded end to Miami, to get ready, to head to homestead air force base for a flight to New York. That was our destination. The irony is that the other teams, we know that five of the teams were headed to the Pentagon who was an attacked itself. So it was an incredible Tuesday morning for everybody.
Host: John Scardena (5m 36s):
Yeah. I mean, like days is kind of burned into my memory, you for obviously different reasons, but you know, like I said, I was still in school. I think that is the first experience that I had outside of family that I observed death and had a comprehend. And why would somebody want to do that? And like some of those emotions. So I think that might've had you know, when somebody passes away of old age, you expected, that's something that you're taught from a child, but to see such a horrible thing. Then it makes you wonder because you're 20 years later and the way we left Afghanistan and the Taliban taken back over, it's like, there's so many emotions.
You're so grateful for the first responders. You're so grateful for all those people that went into the military to protect the United States. We have tried to learn so much and man, and you're just like, it's really disheartening the timing of everything and the way it's happened and, and for what. I don't want to make it about politics, but we did. I still also remember everybody coming together being very United right after 9/11. I mean, I have so many tangents right now. You were talking about your wife 42 years. There's a really famous picture that I have of you, and we're going to put it on social media, have you talking to your wife on the rubble pile? And so, you know, it just shows that you, even in that extreme moment, you still had that situational awareness and you're able to put your priorities in order, how do we all the rest of us get our priorities back in order? Because it doesn't feel like we are at the moment.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (7m 32s):
Well, you know, thanks for realizing that, and there's always strength in numbers. So I was reaching out to my wife for prayer as we went underground, searching for victims and knowing that the pile had shifted and that we were recovering body parts of not only the victims, but also of our brothers within the FD and EMS, NYPD, and port authority emergency responders that were there. So always reaching for the extra person for that partner, for the numbers. We have learned as we get together in numbers, that there is strength, there's strength in being able to share stories and share situations as you, as well learned in growing from just two of you to now be in 40 and a family and the strength that that now brings. I know that you mentioned th ugly head of politics. It just seems to always involve itself in emergency management and emergency response to some pain desire. Our nation's recruiting offices were being filled with young men and women who had a focus mission of taking care of who was responsible for the atrocities that were just a habit to our country. At the same time, our agencies within the cities and counties were filled with recruits, wanting to become firefighters, EMT, paramedics, police officers, correction, workers, anything they can do to serve. I had always taught my children at an early age that whatever they did in life, that it would be very rewarding to them and to others to pick a career that was always giving, give back as opposed to be a taker, be a giver in life. So it's been a pleasure watching my children choose careers in giving back to the country, giving back to humanity and reaping the rewards that are always there with that.
Host: John Scardena (9m 35s):
We've talked about this song previous shows about you being cold star family, and the amount of sacrifice that you and your family have given to this country. But there's not enough. I wouldn't say, I don't know if praise is the appropriate word, but honor that, you know, that we can give you for that. I hope that anybody who listens to this show or comes across in your life, gives you the greatest amount of respect, says a prayer for you and your family and for all the other responders, really, for being willing to go in and go back and go back and deal with that. In fact, when we found out that you're a gold star several months ago, I still remember a sanding prayer with my wife and just hoping you guys find peace and that eternal perspective. In terms of the respective of 9/11, if you're willing, would you actually be willing to walk through the deployment order to onsite and some of the highlights, that not the highlighting, you know what I mean, the moments that would help other people who weren't there, who hope, we hope never have to experience that if they get a call, what will their tempo be like? What will that experience be like for them that you can provide expire advice.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (11m 12s):
I want to start with those that tap into not have their name on the board that day. If might not have been their shift, that might've been their vacation week and the emotions and empty feelings and everything else you can think about that they were ready, educated, trained up to the event. It just wasn't their day, hats off to them because they are in such a needed environment. The teams could really function and put them to work in a really strategic way to help support the teams. Then to the spouses and families, children included of those responders that leave the door. Some of them without a moment's notice some of them without being able to tell their loved ones, I love you, hug them and I'll be back. Other than through a phone call that just didn't exist. Ironically, there was a massive training session going on at TEEX for structural rescue specialist and a lot of the FEMA IST members, incident support team members were away from the area, including folks from Florida, New York, all across the country were at TEEX. It’s Murphy's law when something happens, no one's home, you know, you don't have the wrench to fix the leaky pipe.
So it made it even worse when all air assets were shut down. So here are individuals needing to get into vehicles and be feet from the middle Midwestern part of the United States, all the way up to the Northeastern corridor, whether they were going to help at the Pentagon attack and or the world trade center. So it became a cluster of functions and trying to get everybody there. It wasn't that the country wasn't ready. It was just training going on, just as usual I happened to be off that day. It was my off day from the fire department. We worked at 24 on, 48 off, and my gear bag for the urban search and rescue FEMA response is always inside the house ready to go. My wife and I were going to the post office, my pager had gone off at the same time. My neighbor across the street was walking out towards us and greeted us good morning and asked us if we had heard what happened at the world trade center tower one. I already have my pager going off at the same time. He was telling his story, kind of put the two together and my wife looked at me and said, what do you want to do? I said, well, let's just go ahead and go to the post office and don't know what this day is going to be like. I believe before we even got out of the community, the pager went off a second time, a reference to the second south tower now being struck. I turned to her and said, it's going to be a long or deal. So we finished at the post office came back home, grabbed my bags and of my spouse went on to the high school and gave my love to my children and headed to the city of Miami for a two wheel two hour wheel up, and then a two hour deployment over to homestead air force base for deployment. The irony was president Bush was in Tampa, and nobody really knew what was going on in our country. But we did know that we were under attack at that time. So we were asked to stay in that area until president Bush cleared the Florida boundaries.
Then us along with the other 25 FEMA teams too, I'm sorry, 24 FEMA teams would then dispatch by ground to the world trade center. Then the other four to the Pentagon came beat feet, ground ordeal, and actually the equipment all had to be removed from pallets ready for aviation flight in air force aircraft, the palletized put back into semi-tractor trailers. Buses had to be recalled with drivers for transportation to the World Trade Center. And so you could see as an emergency manager, the logistics help that a planner would need in that kind of an event of saying, hey, this is way beyond my scope of practice. I need somebody with funds with the money availability and that's where emergency management sits down at the table and said, I need my finance guy here because we have an issue getting our team out the door. So you can see how those hats all intermingled with something, Murphy's law plays effect and we change hats.
Host: John Scardena (15m 56s):
Yeah. I mean, what you're talking about really is, maybe it's a romantic view because I wasn't there, it wasn't experiencing it. I can't even imagine not, I can't even imagine that somebody didn't even want to help at that moment. It really did feel like, like a moment in time, snapshot in time, like everything just paused and everybody was singularly focused on this one thing and, you know, support the United States of America support our responders, support this mission. As an emergency manager, that's the kind of new United force. You need that kind of coordination. You need to get things done quickly. I have seen that in large scale responses, but based off of, again, not being there myself, every report that I've seen, everything you're talking about, singularly focused on accomplishing the mission of helping people and then going after the bad guys. I just hope that that concept can resonate with people because that's where we really need to get to we're all on the same team and nobody cared what political party you were with that day or those weeks, those months. You know, that was a powerful moment. So you get on site you're now deployed, you're operating your first image of the twin towers is probably on the news, I'm assuming.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (17m 32s):
Yes, we got up, very slight view of television at the homestead air force base prior to boarding the buses. After that, we had been eliminated from being able to see any type of media at all, which was a totally different from other teams and from other events that we have been to in the every day, the response from the Java center, back to the ground zero site, we didn't have the availability of going outside of the boundaries of the fenced in areas to read any papers. We didn't have any televisions with us. Basically we were just relying on each other's words and really not know what was going on in the rest of the country, especially with our brothers and sisters over at the Pentagon, dealing with what they were dealing with over there and wondering how the two disasters resembled themselves.
Host: John Scardena (18m 26s):
Could you imagine that happening in 2021 with the amount of like social media, just onslaught. My question is like, what were your initial thoughts when you actually arrived on scene? Like, what were your tasks? Like, I understand, what pain, how do you even understand hurricanes, right? I understand large-scale incidents, but you're talking what it was a hundred stories, 200 stories and you're so dry. I can't even, we've talked about surf side, like surf side, you know, just happened and we actually had you on the show. Talk about that. But the scope of it is just incredible to even consider.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (19m 11s):
It's not a flat walk across a football field. It is taking 100 stories of material. Actually, as we just talked about 200 stories worth of material, laying it all on the ground, which makes an incredible rubble pile of steel, where you have to maneuver over under and between through windows, across steel, and then have the other assistance from responders. IE the union steelworkers and the crane operators who were there to help cut and remove the steel as we D layered that pile and tried to make our way down into the sub-basement levels underneath the world trade centers, which is where we were hoping to find those victims in those survivors. I almost welcomed it to, as a young boy growing up black and white TV days, which John, you were still a thought, if that.
Host: John Scardena (20m 9s):
I will say we did have my grandmother's TV. I experienced it, but nothing like that.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (20m 17s):
There was a show that Orson Welles called war of the worlds, and it was a futuristic sci-fi destruction and it was really the only thing I could associate it to was it was incredible, but to see, and that was my speaking, looking at it from the outside in, but when you finally made it to the center of that pile and looked from the inside out, you were blown away by the imagery of what was there and how in the world were we going to start the process of trying to find anyone, if there was any one defined and order bring closure to the families that needed to have closure abroad.
Host: John Scardena (21m 8s):
Yeah. So you had already responded to several. I mean, you've already responded, you know, at least to one terrorist attack before that with Oklahoma city bonding, you've already responded to other incidents, similar, smaller in scope, some somehow smaller in scope. I mean, your training must have truly kicked in in that moment. But it's mind boggling to even consider like the a hundred to a hundred stories times to getting there. You know, you've been there, it's a pretty big area just to begin with, and you're trying to get to the sub floors, but you're trying to get through a hundred floors of material, bringing closure.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (21m 57s):
65,000 gallons of diesel fuel in both of those buildings to operate their generators, over 72 elevators in each building. So the amount of material is just astronomical. Even though as a medical personnel, the lack of victims of not finding the victims that we thought we would find, the potential and the injuries that we saw amongst the first responders, and then assisting with removal of body parts and to bring closure for folks was a doubting experience.
Host: John Scardena (22m 32s):
In surf side, there was a fire that lasts several days, because of the diesel fuel did that happen in a trade center too?
Guest: Joe Hernandez (22m 41s):
Yes, it happened for several days. It was one of the injuries we saw from one of the Indiana task force one members, who had a flash burns from a hot pocket that just rekindled itself. Throughout the first, I would say the good first week, we had FD and Y engines attached to hydrants, loading the pile with water and trying to extinguishing some of the sub-basement fires and we're still in those areas.
Host: John Scardena (23m 12s):
How long did it take you to get to the sub-basement?
Guest: Joe Hernandez (23m 16s):
It didn't take us long, unfortunately, and fortunately I'm small and so they kind of sent the small guys in and the tunnel rats and at first we thought it was going to be really cool. We had radios and ropes and all kinds of stuff and little by little, we knew that radios were not working and the ropes were only so long. Line of sight was the only thing we could depend on. So knowing that the army Corps engineers told us that the buildings had shifted constantly throughout the day throughout the week, two inches, nine inches, you know, four feet and that we needed to be careful in the areas that we were going into. You could smell the salt water intrusion down in those sub basements. So we really tried to stay as close as possible.
Just the irony and the fear, you know, going by the areas where people had eaten in restaurants down there, they'd come out of the subways. They're in the sub basement areas, they're eating at a donut shop and you get a half eaten doughnut with a set of car keys they're on the table and one shoe and so your mind starts going John and say, wow, this person must've just ran and didn't care whether he had one or both shoes on it, was that important for them to get out of that building at that moment in time. Then your mind wonders, did they survive? Did they even make it out? And so there goes the stories and a lot of the members began writing their last names inside of their pant legs and on their arms.
Some of the members that we had found from FD and Y, ironically rescue two members, it was a habit for firefighters as we get our uniforms and our bunker gear washed that we write our names on the insides of the bottom of the leg flaps in the inside of the arm flaps, just so that when they go out to be de-conned or cleaned, they come back and we know whose bunker gear there they are and it was a way of identifying deceased and Y members by rolling up those areas and being able to call back to administration, let them know who we had encountered in at the same time.
I think the fear over came the responders that were down there and just folks just began writing their own names on their own leaves and arms and out came a little pads of papers. A lot of us kept personal journals that we would just write a thought, just in case there was a disassociation or another catastrophe, a second attack, all those thoughts that were going through our heads. At least it would be closure for our families, just like we were finding closure, trying to find closure for those families we were searching for. I mean, you get the hazmat station in squad 288, one station from FD and Y, one station, and you've got 35 hazmat personnel, another 22 fire department fire station personnel. So out of that bunch, they, they lost 19. It was the largest loss of life of any one station within FD and Y and out of 19 individuals that passed, we now have to deal with 51 orphans, fatherless children. One day, one station.
Host: John Scardena (26m 44s):
Magnitude of impact, you know, we talk about you talk about, it’s going to be a really messed up statement and I recognize that. I wrote a very offensive report in my undergrad and I explained that economically, emotionally, the way that we were responding to war at the time was we were losing because what they did, what these terrorists did, monsters did, with such a small force with, you know, $400,000. I think that's what we figured out, what they did and the impact, not just the impact of the immediate loss of life, the impact of the fear of the impact of decades later, you are one of the bravest, if not the bravest person I've ever met. Yet 20 years later, you know, the fact that you're brave enough to even talk about this and you've talked about this with me now a couple of times. The fact that you're still teaching it, the fact that you're still involved with it, the fact that you're focused on helping others be able to handle it because you had to go through it firsthand experience, the impact is just incredible. It goes back to that thought of what are we doing to make sure that Joe Hernandez, hero, a firefighter, unnamed firefighter, in my book heroes who lost their lives, people who are eating at a restaurant, you know, casualty, what are we doing to honor those memories and to honor the, the good people who have had to sacrifice too much? That's the thought that I've been thinking about a lot lately. It's such the same thought I had surf side when we found out the firefighter had pulled out his own daughter and too much sacrifice unfair. This world is unfair and we can do a lot to change that.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (29m 7s):
We sure can and thank you for, bringing those things up. They're important in the response world. Those things are just as important because they are manifestations during and after those responses that take place. Sometimes we don't even count those individuals to the Oklahoma city bombing the reality of divorce going up 800% of the department is unheard of. Why aren't we speaking to those individuals during this event to prepare them for the manifestation changes that are going to go on in the spouse and in the family makeup from this type of an event, and let's prevent those divorces, as you said, economically, it's unsustainable to see that we're at 30% increase in suicide rates.
We're losing more first responders to suicide than on the job deaths, and they're doing it at the station. So where have we come and why have we not prepared those individuals for these certain situations? I briefly spoke with Mike Ley during an interview for our show on Solid Responder regarding the attack on the Pentagon and Ann Carr was the wife of a responder. She had been very instrumental in creating what we knew as the beginning of a family support mechanism. It's strong in Maryland task force one and unfortunately the system had decided to not replicate that particular chapter in education for the new curriculum. I found it in a couple other older instructors, found it intrusive. We found it as a non valuable and it was sad to hear the new millennial thoughts on eliminating some that we felt was so important as we've seen the changes in the generations that affect them as well.
Host: John Scardena (31m 24s):
So my assessment doesn't make sense because there has been such a strong push just in general for mental, I call it mental first aid, like our stigma on mental health is still there, so I call it mental first aid because it makes sense for a little bit better for people, but there's been such a push for that and such a recognition for that. How about the recognition that even as a responder, there are levels, there is not a single person in the United States, yourself included the expert, like the guy, literally who had to have ever had to deal with 200 plus story collapses from a terrorist attack.
You were the guy that responded to the only other, well domestic terrorist event that took out a huge building, a federal building. There has to be some recognition that, hey, this is not normal and because it's not normal. What I mean by normal, I'm seeing this as a guy who's responded to every kind of natural disaster in several manmade disasters in the book, kind of wrote the book. In some ways, I signed up for this stuff that I'm aware of. You know, when firefighters are afraid, when they feel fear and they're writing their name, that means something's different. That that's not your typical house fire. I don't know that everybody's hopefully evacuated already. I don't, know.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (32m 56s):
They're supposed to be 10 foot tall and bulletproof, and that they're not fearing the response of an entry into a building or a car or whatever it is, their fear in life itself and how it's affecting their mental health and their thought patterns and their family and their life and how they're dealing with their other significant other, their children, et cetera. I wish for a certain degree, I grew up and worked in the old firehouse and we didn't have individual bedrooms. We had a common room, we didn't have individualness, we all ate at the table together. Everybody chipped in seven, eight, nine dollars. We all bought dinner and whether we were able to finish cooking it, whether some had to go out on the call, whether we kept it warm until they came back, whether we left them dishes to have to do, to share the responsibilities, it was a family makeup. There was a reason for it. It was to be able to lean on each other when times were tough, but also when it didn't evolve fire department, when it didn't evolve, rescuing anybody, just the everyday chores of man, you know, I'm struggling in this part of my life, or I'm struggling with that part of my life. You got any suggestions and that's really where the strength comes from.
I think we're missing that. I think we're all getting on our social media platforms and we're depending on somebody across that electronic screen to rely on it, to talk to instead of the guy or the girl next to me, who we can share so much together, or even miles away that you and I can get on a zoom call and share some real heart to heart issues. Some thoughts, the mind boggling memories of when I returned home and I went to my children's X elementary school, now they're in high school, went to their elementary schools because we had great relationships with their teachers. I wanted to speak to those children because of what I saw taped up to the walls at the world trade center, as we walked by, and they were pictures of children across the country, drawing, burning buildings, people jumping out of buildings and how does a child process those images from day to day, from week to week, and as parents are we allowing children to be desensitized by watching these type of events and play in these types of games and not having a reality check of what's real and what's not.
Host: John Scardena (35m 32s):
Yeah. The reality check of what's real and what's not. I think even if you see what's real, it's hard to comprehend that it is real. By the way, your comment, I don't want to make light of it, but your training, which is phenomenal, by the way, I've said it like every time we've brought it up is your eye. There was seemingly some responders there at your training that were 10 feet tall and bulletproof, they are not very good for crawling through holes. So you say it's not good, good. The fact that you're small, I would say that God made you small so that you could save some lives and man, I'm 6’2, 220. I felt a little too big in that hole. I don't know. I have definitely appreciated the fact that brave men, brave men and women, as we saw to use hard training, not every size, not every shape is good for every activity. If you want somebody, if you're in a pancake building, I'm hoping that 5’2 buck 20, somebody gets to me because that's who's going to get to me. So it doesn't matter the size and your giant in my book anyways. So I really want to thank you for sharing your experiences.
I think we could talk about this for a while. We've talked about it other shows, you're going to be talking about it probably quite a bit on your show, solid responder. Again, I think everybody should be listening to, to experts talking about their experiences because that's, when you get people who are like, hey, I'm going to develop the curriculum and talk about this, developing programs when I'm achieved for what I'm, whatever. I heard an expert who is at 9/11, say, hey, you got to talk about mental health. Hey, you got to address these problems. You've got to create unity in the stations and maybe these micro-cultures can get a little bit closer. I certainly felt pretty close to people as they were crawling over me and in the practice facility.
Guest: Joe Hernandez (37m 46s):
And that's what I believe that disaster medical solutions and Doberman Emergency Management can bring to the table is that complete exercise of response management, recovery and mitigation, which includes mental health counseling and our general facilities, bringing everything back to the way we were before the disaster happened. So that community integrated disaster response exercise that emergency Doberman emergency management and disaster medical solutions is looking to bring across the country, I think will be an answer to a lot of solutions for agencies, city, tribal, and county.
Host: John Scardena (38m 26s):
Yeah, and I think you and I have this similar methodologies of it's about helping people do better and you and I have taken personal financial hits to be able to do that. But, you know, I feel good doing it. I was so impressed by the training methodology that you have with both the instruction and the repetitive nature of getting in their practice, hotwash and people wanting to stay there longer. People wanting to stay there later, not complaining about missing meals or doing meals later. That is the tenant type of training that we need to have. That builds comradery. By the way you had teams all over the country show up there, and now you're starting to build a network of people, who will be able to talk site. So kudos to you and really what you're doing and the fact that, like I said before man, I can’t even call you man. Well, man is kind of the greatest term you can call somebody if you think of the truest sense of the word, but that being said, you're like a demi-god in my book and of the fact that you've been able to do so many great things. The fact that you can keep coming on the show and be able to talk to people free, by the way, for all of our listeners this is education. I'm happy to pair up with you and to be able to help you out wherever I can, for everybody who's responded to their families, to the survivors, to anybody who saw it on TV for the first time death like myself, I think you and I would both agree that unity is, can help out a lot. Mental health disaster, mental health, disaster, mental, you know, first aid is a big deal. It's not just important for your career, it's about making the tough call. Sometimes the toughest call is say, hey, I went through something extremely unusual here, and I want to make sure that, you know, things work out.
You have 42 years of marriage. Your wife seems awesome. You always talk about her, which means you're awesome. If you're doing it right, if you're happy this many years later, then maybe other people should follow your example. So that's my final call out there. Joe, if you're going to give some advice to a first responder or an emergency manager, anybody who would be dealing with a response, humanitarian even, what would you be your final call to them today?
Guest: Joe Hernandez (40m 59s):
Learn how to take a little trauma out, Not only for yourself, but for those around you, don't expose yourself and don't expose those around you.
Host: John Scardena (41m 18s):
I think we'll end it there, Joe, thank you so much for coming on. You know, you're going to keep coming on the show. I hope your show takes off. We're big fans of it, it's going to be on the Readiness Lab for, for everybody who's wanting to learn a little bit more. It's free education, essentially. In fact, on the Readiness Lab, our little plug for Joe, again, not paid or anything, but we actually put his USR conference on November 30th coming up on there so you can learn more about that. We actually did a backlink to disaster medical solutions so they can check that out. Joe is truly an expert, obviously from this conversation alone, you should check out any other show that he's on.
If you want to reach out to Joe, if you want to thank him for all the work he's done, the best way to do that is to reach out to him directly. We can put that in our show notes, but please tag him, tag Joe Hernandez on LinkedIn on disaster disaster medical solutions, wherever, and just say thank you. That would be our biggest, our biggest, wish is that people actually start thanking them. Then I'm going to guess, Joe's going to agree with me here, maybe it's a really good time to think either through action or through deed, same thing, I guess, to the first responders in your community, that you just send them a note, send them, you know, they need equipment. They need all of this, they need help and have their back. When legislation comes up where they don't want to provide help, how is your local politicians to be able to make sure the first responders get that help they need? I think that's kind of the outcome that we would look from a general public perspective. Totally agree. Totally good. So we're not going to do our wine and dance at the end of this episode, we're just going to leave it with people thinking about 9/11. If you’re a praying type or meditation type, or you're an action person type, just thinking about something that she can help become more United with your first responders and thank the people who have to sacrifice too much and we'll leave it there. You have a good weekend.